GE Oven Door

6/19/09
General Electric Company
Fairfield, CT 06828


Dear GE:

We recently bought a home that included several of your attractive, state-of-the-art appliances. One of our three children is a profoundly inquisitive 20-month-old boy who really wants to climb up the front of your oven. The problem with this is that he’s now heavy enough to pull the door open, sending him crashing backwards onto the tile floor.

I love that your oven doesn’t get hot in the front while something is baking. Naturally, I assumed that there was a means in which to lock the oven door so that my child could stop bonking his head on the floor. Upon closer inspection, I found a latch on the inside of the oven door, but was unable to engage it. Pouring over the manual I was surprised to find this issue was not addressed. The only way the lock seems to engage is while the oven is in self-cleaning mode. Once the cleaning has completed and the oven has cooled, it unlocks itself. I knew this had to be wrong.

A company such as yours that “brings good things to life” and has designed into their whiz-bang oven a “Sabbath” setting to fool God into thinking you’re not actually using this appliance on Saturday (when in fact you are), surely would be equally concerned with the safety of children of all religions 7 days a week. A phone call to your customer service has led me to believe my confidence in your thoroughness, responsibility, and know-how is misplaced. Can it really be true that this oven won’t lock unless it’s cleaning itself? Say it ain’t so.

Hopefully,

Jake Daehler

WGA Registered 2010