Nokia Lumia 2520 UK sales halted due to charger fault

Nokia has temporarily ceased UK sales of its Lumia 2520 tablet over concerns the device's charger could give users an electric shock.

The Finnish phone manufacturer explained the move in a product advisory, where it warned Lumia 2520 users to stop using the device's charger until further notice.

"Under certain conditions, the plastic cover of the charger's exchangeable plug could come loose and separate," the advisory notes.

"If [so], certain internal components may cause an electric shock if touched while the plug remains in the live socket."

The vendor has confirmed around 30,000 of its AC-300 chargers, which work exclusively with the Lumia 2520 tablet, are affected by the advisory notice.

Around 600 of these devices are thought to be travel chargers, which Nokia has also labelled as unsafe to use at this time.

The firm is keen to stress that all other Nokia chargers can continue to be used, although they won't work with the Lumia 2520.

Furthermore, it said no "confirmed" incidents have occurred as a result of the flaw, and there was no evidence using the chargers will have harmed users' devices.

In a statement, Jo Harlow, EVP of smart devices at Nokia, said: "While there have been no confirmed consumer incident related to this potential quality issue, product quality and safety are top priorities at Nokia.

"We apologise to the owners of the Lumia 2520, and we are working with urgency to minimize the convenience," Harlow added.

The tablet went on sale exclusively last December at John Lewis stores in the UK, before going on wider release in March.

It marked the phone maker's first foray into the tablet space, and has been pitted as a challenger to Microsoft's Surface 2 device.

IT Pro recently reviewed the Lumia 2520 and awarded it three stars out of five, with the device's proprietary charger being flagged as one of the tablet's downsides.

Caroline Donnelly is the news and analysis editor of IT Pro and its sister site Cloud Pro, and covers general news, as well as the storage, security, public sector, cloud and Microsoft beats. Caroline has been a member of the IT Pro/Cloud Pro team since March 2012, and has previously worked as a reporter at several B2B publications, including UK channel magazine CRN, and as features writer for local weekly newspaper, The Slough and Windsor Observer. She studied Medical Biochemistry at the University of Leicester and completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Magazine Journalism at PMA Training in 2006.