In the UK the mains electricity that you connect your appliances and gadgets into works on 240 volts. This is a high voltage and can cause serious injury and death if you were to touch a live electrical line. This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sourcesin this section. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Some electric toothbrushes have charging stands that will support 110-240V meaning you will not need the voltage converter. The Philips Sonicare DiamondClean is one example. However, I have noticed that the shaver adapter I use for the Vitality doesn’t charge the other two. Through experiments, I have concluded that the shaver adapters sold now are 1 amp and this isn’t high enough for the Pro range of oral b toothbrushes. I have an ancient 2 amp adapter (belonging to my dad who is now 91) which does charge the Pro series toothbrushes. What you may need though is a plug adapter. This is to convert the 2 pin adapter found on most charging stands in the UK and Europe to work with the power supply in the other country.

I would say the hassle of rewiring a plug vs obtaining an adapter is less for many? Is it really safer? Under most circumstances if you include water and electricity the effects of injury are much greater as water reduces the resistance the human body has to the electrical current.There is good reason behind the 2 pin adapter, I will now explain this and I promise I won’t get too technical. Additionally, the design allows for a more compact and less bulky design of mobile phone chargers, than the BS 1363 form factor in the UK. Right now, aside from switching to a completely different brand of brush that can charge from the USB port in your van (Sonicare DiamondClean/DiamondClean Smart) you have no other option. I have a multi-travel adaptor bought at an airport that accepts my UK bathroom plug without problem. But I also have 2 different ones that will not accept it, but they will accept the Euro-plug.(these are the large adaptors that can be used for multiple countries by extending different pin configurations out of the body

KS: there is ONE problem that you might face, and it does not matter if you have a shaver or a toothbrush. Most electric toothbrushes bought in the UK and Europe have charging stands that work on 220-240V. So to use them in the USA, you need a power converter to allow the charging stand to accept the 110V. The staff in Boots are wrong too. The Genius 9000 is the model they are talking about here. It has a travel case, which has a USB port on it. However, this USB port is like a pass-through power port and does not accept the charge into the case itself.For example, let’s say you live in the UK and are going to the USA and assuming you are going long enough that you need to charge your brush when there. Fused conversion plugs to BS 1363-5 are available for Europlugs, and equipment fitted with these may be legally sold in the UK. [7] BS4573 (UK shaver) [ edit ]

The 1 amp fuse is a lot shorter than my standard 3 amp and 5 amp fuses otherwise I would simply change the fuse and see if that worked. So, technically....... if the shaver plug is based on the old BS546 plug, if I could find a round to square pin adaptor I could use that instead? Why is replacing a shaver plug the most obvious answer for charging outside a bathroom? (genuine question).

Will you be claiming the VAT back?

Not an electrician in any sense of the word… just want my toothbrushes to charge and can’t find a “shaver” 2 pin to 3 pin adapter sold now which doesn’t have the extra short 1 amp fuse. If you're using a UK appliance abroad you can use a UK to EU plug adapter as most have the round pin spacing on them. I've never seen an EU to UK bathroom adapter. Buying more adapters will add to environmental problems caused by the prolifieration of waste electrical equipment. Many homes will however, have spare three pin plugs for reuse. Europlugs are only designed for low-power (less than 2.5A) ClassII (double-insulated) devices that operate at normal room temperature and do not require a protective-earth connection.