500H Electric bun steamer

I bought this from aliexpress.com, and this is the worst company to deal with in terms of customer service. There is no phone number to call, and you have to communicate via their chat platform. It would not be all too bad if their chat connection would stop disconnecting or if only one person could handle the communication. For instance, in a chat conversation yesterday, I must've spoken with over eight representatives in the course of close to an hour -- and have gotten nowhere in resolving my defective bun steamer as pictured here. I have only used this bun steamer for one week, and it was one problem after another. On the very first day of use, the low water buzzer came on for no reason. There was adequate amount of water still left in the tank. The thermostat light was on and steam was still producing. Then, the thermostat stops working no matter what temperature you have it adjusted at. Even at the lowest temp, the water was still producing steam at the highest temperature. I'd tried to turn the power off with the toggle switch, not realizing that that was not working either. Eventually, all the water boiled out and thus leaving an empty tank and a red hot glowing element and smoke. I thought the steamer was going to catch on fire. In addition to communicating with aliexpress.com, I was told to also to message the seller. An Eric Chan that I have been communicating with via the message platform on aliexpress is of no help. After numerous endless messages, he wanted me to take photos of the malfunctioning of the bun steamer. First of all, unless there is physical damage to the unit, one is not going to be photographed this kind of problems. If there was a broken door or other part, then a photo would be able to show that damage. Now Eric Chan wants be to take the unit apart and diagnose it myself. I have a business to run and am in need of a bun steamer asap! I have wasted four days of endless messages with Eric Chan and aliexpress.com. I highly advise AGAINST buying from Chef Essentials and aliexpress.com . I've been trying to get a full refund or a replacement steamer. I don't want a replacement anymore after this horrible experience with Chef Essentials and Eric Chan, along with aliexpress.com Perhaps if I bought this from amazon, the situation may have been handled differently. But, I would not buy a Chef Essentials product ever again. Is my bun steamer not under warranty? I thought I had one year. Apparently not. Buy from Chef Essentials at your own risk. And, certainly don't deal with Eric Chan. Not sure if he is the owner or what his role is with the company. Pictured is wasted buns in the garbage from being overcooked from faulty bun steamer.

I will lead this review with how pleased I am with the seller "jimmy2016". He was very responsive and answered all of my questions, but be sure make contact through the "contact seller" button! We are using this appliance for our new restaurant in New York City. Despite the high density of Chinese bakeries here, finding this item locally has been nothing short of a nightmare. Very few local suppliers carry it and the ones that do offer no warranty and do not even allow returns. One local supplier told me that after we paid, we could plug it in at the store to make sure it works, but even then there are no returns! That's right, even if the item is totally busted, I wouldn't have been able to return it. A search online yielded only one model from a so called "reputable" manufacturer, sold by a "reputable" supplier that costed over $2000! And no, there was no way I was going to roll the dice and buy direct from Asia via AliExpress. Therefore, I was more than thrilled to find this product available on Amazon. Aside from Amazon's A-Z protection, jimmy2016 offers a 7 day return policy and a 1 year warranty that covers parts. Peace of mind means everything in this business. The best part, the item actually shipped from the US! We got it in about a week. Such a pleasant surprise as the listing says it ships from China and it takes 1-2 months to arrive! This is a new seller that we are glad to have taken a chance on. Note to jimmy2016 - change your name to something more official and update your listing to include your return and warranty policy and that it doesn't actually ship from China! So why only 4 stars? Put shortly, the construction screams budget appliance, but we paid a budget price. You're paying for value, not luxury. What's important is that it steams great and our buns come out just the way we need them. The top temp is higher than the other models we looked at (110C on the dial). There is a failsafe on this model - if the water gets too low the heating element turns off. A critical feature, as the heating element will burn out without water. This failsafe is not readily available on other models. The item also has a CE compliance mark - another detail that ought to be in the listing. While the item gets the job done, here is why I didn't give it 5 stars. The item arrived with a few dings, one of the grates was broken and I had a bit of difficulty with the glass partition that goes above the top rack. The glass partition also had a few dings from poor packing, but its still usable. However, as of this morning the seller has told me that replacement parts are on the way. The racks themselves are a bit wobbly and they seem slightly undersized when placed on the railings. After draining the appliance, a little water still remains in the compartment that houses the heating element, so you'd have to vacuum it out or soak it with something if you want it to be completely dry. The instructions included are not written eloquently and it was missing instructions on how to install the glass partition above the rack. In fact it was not immediately clear what the glass was for and it took some inspection to figure it out, though it wasn't difficult. The seller emailed me this part of the manual upon request. I assume the purpose of the glass partition is to collect condensation and keep it away from the lighting element. Moisture does end up in the lighting compartment anyway and only time will tell what the impact will be. The lighting compartment can be opened so you can clean it and the light is elevated above where water would gather so it should be ok. This is why we rely on the CE compliance mark to tell us that the appliance is safe for use. In conclusion, a great value for your money and we are happy we took the chance! A 4 star product that can easily be improved to 5 with a few tweaks by the manufacturer.

Bought 6 of these and they're all working great. Quality is not the best but it's great for a low price like this.

Good!!

Big thing for me: It's easy to keep clean. Second big thing: It'll be easy to repair if anything goes wrong. You can't have commercial kitchen equipment that doesn't mean those two requirements in my opinion. That is all. If you're shopping for one of these, nothing else I have to say would be of any value. You know what you're looking at.

This cabinet is pretty well built and was easy to set up. The cabinet has a really large capacity and produces a lot of steam pretty fast. The cabinet looks nice and we are using it to keep bread products hot. I wish, however, that it could be used for dry heat also, but it only works when there is water in the water container. This is a great safety feature, but it would be nice to have a steam free option. The light on mine came not working, it may be just a bad bulb, but we do not need the light so I have not even checked it yet. Otherwise, a really good hot box at a really good price. Four stars.