A LICKEY End pensioner, who paid cash for a new washing machine, was told she would not be getting her appliance or her money back when an electrical firm went bust.

Laura Sawyer has spent her savings on a new kitchen for her Spadesbourne Road home and was looking forward to completing the revamp with a new washing machine.

She chose an appliance from the PowerHouse store in Bromsgrove's High Street and handed over £450 in cash in June.

Her son Evan Sawyer explained: "She paid for the appliance but did not want it delivered until the kitchen was finished, so PowerHouse agreed to keep it until then. Basically they were just warehousing it."

However, by the time Laura was ready to have her washing machine delivered, the company had gone into receivership.

Evan continued: "My mother is what is known as an unsecured creditor, so she will not receive her machine or her money back. The banks are the secured creditors so they are top priority with customers at the bottom of the queue.

"She is in her eighties and the new kitchen was a real treat for her. She feels likes she has been ripped off."

Another elderly couple, who did not wish to be named, contacted the Advertiser/Messenger after PowerHouse also left them high and dry.

The couple bought a £350 gas cooker to replace their electrical appliance, following the spate of power cuts across the district. They were also roped in to paying for insurance for the item.

However, after discovering the firm had gone into receivership, they also found out they would not be getting their cooker or their cash.

"As pensioners we really cannot afford to lose this amount of money and feel we have been taken for fools," they said.

PowerHouse was asked for a comment but had not done so as we went to press.