I have a fairly busy life as a mother, even though I am on maternity leave from my office job, I'm taking college courses and visiting family and refurbing my new home. And, like any Yorkshire resident, where would I be without my cups of tea!? So when I saw the Rapid Boil kettle for sale in Sainsbury's, I jumped at the chance - boiling water for my tea? Faster? Yes please!

The Sainsbury's Rapid Boil kettle retails at £12.99 however I purchased it at £9.99 on sale. It is styled in black which I think is a bit more unusual for a budget kettle, and I bought it partly for this reason as I have a black kitchen in my apartment. I have since realised you should base your kettle purchases on a bit more than appliance fashion!

The kettle is a standard jug style cordless with a base, the cord to the base to the power outlet is plenty long enough which is good. Overall I'd say it looks more expensive than it is, especially considering the bargain price I paid for it. It looks quite modern and sleek.

The kettle holds 1.7 litres of water, more than enough for my uses with my husband and for cooling to put in a bottle for my daughter. Now, it says it is fast boil, but maybe my previous kettle was fast boil too, because all I can say is that the kettle boils at a perfectly average rate but not amazingly fast. It has a removable lime scale filter, which is good if you live in a hard water area, but I don't so it's not a feature I can say I have had much knowledge or experience of. I'm from near Leeds in Yorkshire a notoriously hard water, lime heavy area and this feature would be very useful over there. It's not one you generally see on budget kettles. I had resorted to filtering my water in a Brita first then boiling it, but with this kettle you may not need to.

The kettle boils water quite well, not much to say on that, and if that's all there was to it I'd probably give it a five out of five as there's not much you can complain about on a basic kettle, right? But this kettle in my opinion has a serious design flaw and one that personally had I known about I'd have steered well clear of it. I don't think it is sold in it's present design in Sainsbury's any more and this might be the reason why.

The lid to the kettle has a little catch for opening it so you can put it right under the tap and fill it up so you don't have to fill it down the spout like some kettles. But I have found when I fill the kettle up near capacity, the rolling boil of the kettle makes the lid pop up with some force. Obviously the steam means that if I attempted to push the lid back down I would most probably burn myself. So you have to leave it to boil or precariously switch it off with the lid popped. This is really dangerous - if you hadn't noticed it pop up whilst it was boiling you could potentially tip it up to pour into your cup and scald yourself quite badly.

This started to happen about six weeks after I had purchased the kettle though I still had the receipt. So, I took it back to Sainsbury's and exchanged it for a branded kettle (adding a little bit in cash). I think they readily accepted the design flaw though they did not say it was widespread and as I didn't want a replacement Fast Boil (as I was worried about the safety) they removed it from resale, which was good.

So overall I cannot at all recommend the Sainsbury's Fast Boil Kettle, and I can't say I'd buy another Sainsbury's kettle full stop as I feel I have had my fingers burned - though thankfully, figuratively, and not literally, as could all too easily have happened.

Had this not been the case this kettle would have been a four or a five out of five easily. But now? Since it could and probably would scald anyone who used this for more than a few weeks from new, I certainly believe this to be a dangerous kettle and therefore if I could award it a 0/5 I would. As that is not an option I will award it a 1/5 and advise you never to buy, receive or use the Sainsbury's Fast Boil kettle.