Fisher & Paykel WashSmart WH8560P2 (8.5kg)

Water pouring randomly one daz – We have had this Washing Machine for 3 and a half years. It suddenly started pouring water from underneath. Had nothing to do with the drain pipe as I emptied this properly. Very disappointing as it is coming beneath the machine from the front and the Machine has always been level, yet suddenly started this random purge of water behind the drain… Read more

plug. Have had Bosch before and honestly for such a short period of time for this to happen, would not recommend this Machine to anyone. Andrew

Great washing machine but not reliable – We (did) really like this washing machine, very quiet and washed clothes well. Has heaps of wash cycle options. We're a family of 5 and so we use it almost daily and wash 6-8 loads of washing a week. Now after only owning for less than 4 years, the machine sounds like a jet engine on spin cycle and the bearings are totally worn. We just got Fisher… Read more

& Paykel technician out ($130 callout) to be told it's going to have to go to workshop to replace bearings at a cost of $700. We mainly wash cold water and we're told that this is the cause, apparently it doesn't break down the detergent enough which then gunks up and slowly destroys the rubber seal protecting the bearings. We're pretty disappointed with the reliability and now looking for a new washing machine instead of wasting money on repair.

Washes well when it decides to work but good customer care – Constantly getting ‘clear filter’ error every single load. We follow instructions to clear filter (never find any debris or blockage) and will have the same issue again the following load. Update: Booked a repairman through Fisher Paykle online without having to wait on hold. Repair man fixed attend out house and fixed it within 48 hours. Call out, repairs and parts were $200 all up. It was the pump that was broken.  Show details

Same issues as my last front loader from F&P. Instant regrets – I replaced my old f and p washer with this machine thinking that the issues with the other machine would be worked out by now as that was first generation. Sadly no. The machine does wash well, is super quiet and has great options but it never spins properly if I wash bed sheets or bath mats, I manually have to wring the items out as it will not… Read more

balance and spin. I was load can end up taking me hours. It’s so frustrating.

My last machine did this also, I know my machine is definitely balanced it just doesn’t like certain items in the drum which isn’t practical.

I wish I chose another brand of machine. Now I will be stuck with this issue until it dies in 5-6 years

Don't buy this product or use this company – I recently purchased the above machine thru a large national retailer (last week) and after only 2 days (and having not been used) there was a terrible odour coming from the product. Initially we thought it was a dead animal in the wall of our laundry however after some research we found out it was in fact mould in the machine. I contacted F&P to… Read more

advise them of the issue and the fact it was so bad it had now permeated throughout our whole house and had my made my wife sick however the two ladies I spoke in NZ (F&P contact centre) showed absolutely no care whatsoever. The machine was 3 days old and hadnt been used but was making my house unliveable and they didnt give a damn. They asked for photos??? Not sure what this would show and according to everything I had looked up on Google the issues related to mould on the drum and to access this I would need to remove the back panel. I am not a sparky and would not be doing this. They said they would need to book a technician to check on it and that they couldnt do this for another 4-5 days. This wasnt acceptable as the smell was so severe I had disconnected the machine and moved it into the garage however the smell was now taking over our entire house. I explained this to them and once again absolutely no care. I ended up taking the machine back to the retailer who immediately exchanged it for another brand and at the time of doing this they mentioned that the quality of products and service from F&P ever since they had been bought out by Haier was now very poor. I would strongly recommend to anyone considering buying a F&P product that after my experience they look elsewhere

Takes Forever – A household of two and we do washing about once a week - a few loads that day. Have had the machine for over a year now. It cleans my clothes very well. Many different settings, so you can choose how long or vigorous you want to do your wash. The handwash and delicates setting is great - really gentle with my clothing. It gets rid of unrelenting… Read more

cat hair too. The machine is built out of nice materials and feels good quality. Looks great. It is fairly quiet except when putting water into the barrel it is very loud. The only thing I don't like about this washing machine is how long it takes. The time indication on the control panel is not accurate. A 59 minute wash has taken me 90 minutes before. All washes are longer than what they say they will be. Very annoying - I just want to know how long it will be so I can plan accordingly.

Solidly built, poorly programmed – The only positive feature of this Fisher and Paykel WH8560P2 WashSmart washing machine, is that the door and soap drawer feels solid compared to a number of other makes currently on the market. I wanted to upgrade my 15 year old Westinghouse Mastermind and while I was originally only interested in other brands, I bought the F&P machine as I was… Read more

categorically assured by the Harvey Norman salesman, that the time indicated at the start of the wash on this F&P washing machine, was the actual total time the wash would take. This was a critical feature for me but turned out to be a blatant misrepresentation of the truth. Unfortunately, the overall operation of the machine has been a big disappointment too.

The initial filling with water takes about 9-15 short bursts, varying from one to a few seconds each with long pauses in-between, taking about 4 minutes before the correct amount of water has been added. Each addition of water is extremely noisy so starting a wash on a delayed start for early morning, is enough to disturb any sleep. This process of filling to the nearest few millilitres is unnecessary and the multiple short-burst on-off demand on the instant hot water gas heater during filling, cannot be good for the heater. My old machine was much quieter when filling.

The wash and spin cycles are fairly quiet though. Ironically when the wash is completed, the ‘clack’ of the machine switching off is louder than the ‘beeping’ alarm indicating the end of a wash. These beeps can hardly be heard even in the adjacent room and if you are anywhere else in the house, they are inaudible so you never know when the washing is ready to hang up.

The drum churns backwards and forwards for ages before each spin-cycle for rinses and final drying to ‘balance’ the load. It even does this with a light load, tested with a single shirt. The time indicator doesn’t change during this process – for example, it can remain on a particular ‘time to go’ time indication for 10 minutes or longer. Each spin cycle eventually starts to spin but then for no apparent reason, slows down for a while – during this time it spins too fast for clothes to re-balance and too slow for water to be driven out of the load effectively. Just another time waster. Although the machine is rated for 8.5kg (dry weight according to the literature), washing a 2kg synthetic Duvet resulted in the machine churning backwards and forwards without going into the spin cycle. After 20 minutes of this futile activity and no change in the time-to-go displayed, we removed the wet Duvet without it having gone through any spin cycle. The Duvet was the only item in the machine and filled the drum evenly.

The drum frequently stops and does nothing, pondering what it’s going to do next and seems to do some things sequentially when it could be doing both at the same time. This wastes more time. Our normal cycle (40 deg, 2 rinses, 800 RPM spin) which now shows 59 minutes at start, actually takes anything from 80 – 100 minutes, a variation of 20 minutes. My Westinghouse showed 47 minutes for the same settings and actually took 50 minutes. This allowed better time management and even with a shorter overall wash time, it did a better job of washing and spin-drying than this F&P machine. It filled quickly, didn’t mess around with spinning and even with a longer spin cycle which left the clothes drier but not a creased, the total time to wash and spin a load was shorter, providing more flexibility in choosing the time at which one could do a load.

One never knows with any degree of certainty, when the wash is going to end so can’t accurately plan to do a load and be able to hang it up just before going out. This random end time together with the inaccurate ‘time to go’ indicator and soft ‘end of wash beeps’, results in one having to constantly check over the final 20 minutes whether the wash has finished if one wants to hang up the washing immediately.

The F&P spin-dry cycle is shorter than the Westinghouse, leaving clothes damper and taking longer to dry (a temperature controlled, dehumidifying drying cupboard which previously dried garments in 6 hours – F&P now takes 6.5 to 7 hours for the same amount of clothes). For an 8 minute end of wash spin cycle, only about 4 minutes is at full RPM. If one uses a higher spin speed to get them drier, the clothes are more creased. Even on 800 RPM, the F&P creases clothes more.

For each rinse cycle, half the fresh water is introduced, the clothes rinsed for a few minutes then more fresh water added to the soapy rinse water shortly before emptying all of the rinse water. Adding fresh water to soapy water halfway through the rinse cycle achieves little and is an inefficient use of clean rinse water. Using the full amount of fresh water for the full rinse cycle would be more effective. The Westinghouse sprayed fresh water into the middle of the load during a slow spin which is even more efficient for rinsing.

During the final spin, a significant amount of soapsuds and scum are noticeable in the door area. This means that the same residue has not been removed from the clothes either. Reducing the amount of soap makes little difference to this and clothes don’t get cleaned properly. Even with the normal amount of soap, gardening clothes are not cleaned as well as with the Westinghouse and some items have to be prewashed by hand to get them properly cleaned. This was not needed with the Westinghouse 40 deg wash.

While solidly built, the programming of this machine seems amateurish and while F&P claim to have a machine which conserves water and power, this has had no noticeable reduction in my utility useage. The filling process is extremely noisy, the ‘time-to-go’ display bears no relevance to reality, the end of wash ‘beep’ inaudible and after a year of use, it is still very apparent that this F&P washing machine is less effective in cleaning and spinning our laundry and is a huge time waster compared to my 15 year old Westinghouse. I have had other F&P appliances which have been great but there seems to be a lack of some ‘Kiwi ingenuity’ in the overall functionality of this machine.

Edited: Initially a great machine, now I'm having issues after 1.5 years – Update 2: Customer service was good, however I was very unhappy to find that the main bearing had failed in the washer after only 1.5 years. Fisher & Paykel noted this would take 4 weeks to fix, so I pushed for a refund instead. Bearing issues seem to be very common for Fisher & Paykel washers, so I would tread carefully if you're considering… Read more

any Fisher & Paykel Washer. Unfortunately, I found many reviews and Reddit posts about this same issue too late.

In looking for a replacement washer, I considered swapping with the latest Fisher & Paykel, however they have cut costs and removed the hot water tap inlet. They have also changed the programs, so now you cannot do a 60 or 90 degree wash on the everyday cycle or the quick cycles - this was one of my favourite features not offered by many other washers.

Ultimately I went with a Samsung replacement, which has been okay so far. I do miss the features of the Fisher and Paykel, and slightly quicker wash time, but two years in and I haven't had any issues so far.

_________________________________ Update 1:

I will leave my original review below, because I think those points still stand. However after now owning this machine for a year and a half, I've run into some trouble leading me to believe F&P have a quality control issue.

After a year and a half of light use (2 person household, 2 washes a week), and following the maintenance and cleaning instructions perfectly, the machine has become incredibly noisy.

It now reaches 84 decibels on the spin cycle, and the drum now makes a grinding and squeaking noise when you turn it by hand to get that last piece of clothing. I personally think the main bearing has failed, which I think is crazy considering it's only a year and a half old.

I have reached out to Fisher & Paykel for them to assess the machine under warranty. I am very annoyed that I have to do this, especially during such a risky Covid period.

I will post an update regarding their service at a later date. (The bearing was the issue, and as a major failure with an estimated repair time of up to 4 weeks, I pursued a refund from the retailer.)

_________________________________ Original Review:

This washing machine has been the best I have used so far! (Read until the end)

We came from a 6 year old Electrolux, which was incredibly loud, leaving marks on clothes, and smelt bad (no drum cleaning cycle made it harder to maintain).

This Fisher and Paykel fixed all of those issues and more! The best benefits it has include: - It is amazingly quiet (I can finally run my washer at night!) - The cycles have great variety (the quick 15 minute wash is a favourite for time saving and watching the vortex action) - The most-used cycles are so quick for a front loader - The wash results are amazing - There is a drum clean cycle

In my previous washing machines, I have always had a shirt or two come out with a stain that I didn't see before the wash. Now I can even place shirts with an oil drop on them, and it will wash out like magic!

I was very skeptical when buying a washer - my thought was, why would I pay an extra $200 when I can buy an LG or Samsung. There were some concerning reviews about spin not working, cycles dragging on, etc. My parents have always believed in their brand (and grandparents), hence I thought I should go for it.

Additionally, I believe Fisher and Paykel have fixed a lot of these issues (I think this is a new "series" now). Regardless, my machine spins within a few minutes (including towels, sheets, and mats), it never leaks, and always washes well.

My only concern - on hot washes (60-90 degrees), the drain pump starts to sound a little funny - nothing too concerning, but I feel like the pump might be the first maintenance item in the future!