If you’ve been reaching for your hot water bottle as the temperatures drop, there’s a key feature you may want to check on it, as Which? consumer experts warned it may not be ‘safe’
Hot water bottles are a great way to heat yourself up as the temperatures drop and can sometimes be so effective they prevent you from putting your heating on.
But did you know that the hot water bottle you’re using at the moment may not be “safe”? But there’s a way to check whether you can carry on using it, according to Which?.
The consumer experts took to TikTok to explain the way to “check if your hot water bottle is still safe to use” – and it’s by checking a little-known symbol you may have just overlooked every time you’ve refilled it.
The expert explained hot water bottles “have a short life span” and warned “the older they get, the more likely they are to burst or leak”.
He said: “According to the Children’s Burns Trust, if yours is more than two years old, then it’s too old,” which will shock many who have had their hot water bottles for a long time.
“To make sure, you can check your bottle’s date of manufacture – just look out for this handy daisy wheel symbol,” he shared. The Which? expert said inside the wheel is the hot water bottle’s date of manufacture, and if you want to be “more specific, the petals represent the 12 months of the year and the dots are the weeks in those months”.
On Reddit’s casual forum, someone echoed this advice, saying: “Old hot water bottles can break and cause serious burns. So, it is advised to regularly check for signs of wear and tear and not use hot water bottles that are more than two years old.”
Someone admitted they had their hot water bottle for 20 years, and then one day it “burst”. “I grew up with the same hot water bottle for about 20 years. It was probably older than me. I remember one evening I filled it up and the rubber burst,” they shared, saying they luckily weren’t hurt, but it could’ve been a lot worse.
Which?’s expert shared “hot water bottles can be recycled,” but it’s best to check with “your local council to check they can go in your household recycling”.
“Remember to always check your hot water bottle for signs of wear and tear like split seams, perished rubber, and a poorly fitting stopper,” he warned and also suggested when you buy a replacement, you check the daisy symbol to check you really are “getting something brand new” – rather than a hot water bottle that’s been sitting in storage for years.
In the comments of the video, some admitted they had a hot water bottle since “the 80s”. Someone warned, however, “the material naturally degrades overtime even with proper use”.
Others said they “never heard” of people using hot water bottles, and someone joked: “You obviously don’t live in the UK.”
