My landlord requires renters’ insurance of all tenants, and includes their own as part of the rent unless the tenant has some other source.
Almost certainly a connection in the box where the vacuum cleaner was plugged in has failed.
Savvy electricians on service calls for dead outlets will ask “Where do you plug in the vacuum cleaner?” and start investigating that outlet.
Update: The superintendent took a look at the outlets in question (the one I plugged the vacuum into and the one that blew up my kettle) and he couldn’t see anything amiss. I do have renters insurance for everyone that asked.
If I could afford it I would definitely hire my own electrician to take a look but that’s not feasible at the moment and so I’m just going to keep an extremely close eye on the situation and document anything out of the ordinary.
Unless the superintendent is an electrician, you should probably plan on moving as soon as you can. First and foremost, it’s not safe. Second, you’ll continue to lose appliances due to the fluctuating voltage.If you do want to document this, I suggest getting a voltmeter and learn how to use it to measure voltage at outlets (hot to neutral, hot to ground, and neutral to ground).
Dag_Otto gives a good suggestion. You can also purchase a small outlet tester for a few bucks. They’re dumb, but effective. They will indicate improper neutral and ground connections, as well as reversed hot and ground. When I was living in apartments, I would check every single outlet for proper operation prior to moving in and report any problems to the landlord on my walk-through report.
When we used to tour around Europe with a caravan, I used one of those “dumb” testers to check polarity when plugged into the site power. There was no standard, so I made a simple reversing link and used that where needed.
Polarity matters with UK wiring because all switches are single pole and it’s best it they all break the same leg.
Of course, I meant “reversed hot and NEUTRAL” in my previous post.
Still is, a new series started a couple of weeks ago.
IANAL, but …
I agree with those who have sounded the alarm about the potential risks of this situation.
If it were me, I’d write a letter to the landlord (NOT the superintendent), sending it via Certified Mail, Return Receipt Requested (or by whatever method Notices are to be sent, in accordance with your Lease/Rental Agreement), ensuring that they are aware of a possible health and safety issue with your unit.
You need to protect yourself, here.
The Superintendent ‘taking a look at the outlets in question’ is an inadequate response to this situation … IMHO.
Good luck !
I would add to your letter as instructed by @DavidNRockies that if they do not properly address the situation, you will hire your own electrician and submit the bill the landlord for reimbursement/deduction from future rent. Yes you’ll likely need to cover the bill yourself in the immediate term, but it’s absolutely proper to ask them to reimburse you for those costs. They’d have no qualms about doing that to you if you damaged the apartment and didn’t repair it to their satisfaction.
Such a move should be enough to get them to spring into action with their own electrician, since they will get bids/quotes and won’t be totally in the dark about how much it might cost. Another thing to say in the letter is that you will put your rent in escrow until the situation is resolved, after they’ve been given enough time to address it (usually 30 days minimum), and yeah having the super just take a look is not adequate. There’s some good procedural information about that here. Again, the threat is the motivation, you likely won’t have to actually do it, just let them know you’re not a pushover.
Does the superintendent even know what he is looking for, or was it all theatre to make you think things were good?
I know, people often live in apartments so they don’t have to deal with this kind of thing. However, having evidence on your side can go a long way towards getting things fixed. If my tenant came to me and said “my kettle died, call an electrician!” but left unsaid that it was an 18 year old kettle that had just spent 1000 miles bouncing around in a moving truck, I’m going to respond very differently than if the tenant says “my kettle died, and there’s something wrong with that outlet because it’s running at 220, not 110.” In the second case, my first call is to an electrician, then I’m paying to replace the kettle. In the first case, I might come out and check the outlet, or maybe just do nothing.
Be very careful with something like that. Where I live not paying your rent is a real quick way to get evicted, even if you are having a dispute with the landlord. Not paying immediately can put you in the wrong, regardless of what else is happening.
I do agree about the possibility of there being a problem, and getting it checked out, however, it’s also possible it was just a couple of coincidences.
Vacuum cleaners are high power devices, and it’s entirely possible that the circuit the vacuum was plugged into was being over used, and the breaker correctly tripped. Wiring is not always obvious. That particular outlet might be on a shared circuit with some other high power devices, that aren’t necessarily nearby.
The kettle might have just died, and it had nothing to do with the local power. It had just been moved, and was possibly damaged during that.
Absolutely get things checked by a proper electrician, but it is also entirely possible nothing is wrong, and you just need to learn the quirks of your new apartment (can’t vacuum while the microwave is running!)
An outlet tester is not a bad idea. Something simple like below will be available at any hardware store. Plug it in, the lights will come on, and then the key will tell you if the polarity is reversed, ground is bad, or anything like that.
Testing all of the outlets won’t let you know if something in the electrical panel is bad, but if all of the outlets are correct, then that is a good sign. If the outlets are randomly wrong in some way, then that is a sign that whoever has been doing the electrical maintenance does not know what they’re doing, and there could be bigger problems.
And also as suggested, if you’re comfortable with a multimeter, you can test the voltages of the outlet your kettle was plugged into, and other stuff.
It’s a good thing you have renters insurance–there’s a reasonable possibility that you’ll need to use it quite soon.
By the way–if you can’t afford to pay an electrician, how will you be able to afford medical care for smoke inhalation or burns?
Reminds me:
Make sure your smoke detectors work. If they don’t, call your landlord/super to get them working right away. A new battery for a smoke detector is the cheapest insurance you’ll ever buy.
Yes! Do this soon.
I just noticed “kettle” - are you in North America or in the UK? UK/European ring circuits and regular outlets providing 240 volts are completely foreign to us on this side of the world, so our remote troubleshooting abilities are iffy at best.