Get a new breaker and see if it trips again. If everything will be fine it was the breaker. If it happens again, there is a short someplace or a bad compressor.

Test button after resetting?

(OP said, "(it's actually an outlet with the GFI button built in)")

Where did the two posts about breakers failing come from. OP talks about an outlet.

Breakers don't normally fail randomly. But I guess, anything is possible. You could get yourself a cheap $5 outlet tester with a GFCI test feature.

Or if you want to splurge, you can get a outlet tester on steroids for about $50. That device is sweet. I am tempted, even though I don't really need it :-)

I suspect the most likely scenario is a frayed cable, or some dirt or moisture bridging some electrical connections. If you know what you are doing, you can probably take the water cooler apart, clean all the parts and then put it back together. You might find though, that you need proprietary replacement parts that make this repair difficult.

On the other hand, a GFCI outlet costs between $10 and $25 depending on whether you shop based on price, or whether you buy something a little more solidly built. So, that would be a cheap thing to replace in order to rule out the outlet as the root problem.

Where did the two posts about breakers failing come from. OP talks about an outlet.

GFCI outlets are breakers. They just happen to be installed inside of an outlet. You always have the option of relocating the GFCI breaker into your main breaker box and installing a regular outlet instead. Code allows for either option, and by-and-large its just a personal choice.

Oh, and breakers do different things these days. They protect against overcurrent. That's the same thing those old-style fuses would do. They protect against electricity finding a path to ground, possibly through a person's body. That's what GFCI (ground fault circuit interrupters) do and how they protect people from electrocuting themselves. And they protect against wires sparking because of poor connections. That's what AFCI (arc fault circuit interrupters) do and how they protect your house from catching fire.

Code has different rules about which locations need which type of breaker.

On the other hand, an outlet is essentially a passive device. It connect your copper wiring to the blades of your plug. It doesn't normally fail unless it mechanically falls apart (and yes, that does happen).

"GFCI outlets are breakers." No they're not!

GFCI outlets are NOT "breakers."

Really?! Now you want to talk semantics?

It's a gizmo that senses an electrical condition and breaks the circuit. It's a breaker by any reasonable definition of the word. Why do you think other English-speaking countries refer to it as a residual-current circuit breaker (RCCB)? Yes, there are other types of circuit breakers. But that's besides the point (and I did list them for you).

Traditionally, in US residential electrical wiring, we combine ground fault detection with over current detection, when the breaker is located in a breaker box; but we separate the functions when ground fault protection happens somewhere else. Other than convention, there really is no reason one way or another, and in fact once you get into other types of installations or into other countries, things look different.

As for GFCIs being labeled misleadingly as they don't actually test for ground, that's technically true. I give you that. But in practice the term is a pretty good short-hand. Electricity doesn't just leak out of your wires. It can only go back to a place that it has a relative potential to. In the case of mains voltage, that has to be either the other hot or the neutral. And we don't really care much about short-circuits with other circuits or about multiwire branch circuits. Yes, they'll trip a GFCI. But that's not the primary type of fault we want to protect from. Overcurrent and arc fault devices already handle this case pretty well.

So, that only leaves current that travels back through the ground, the ground rod, and then to the point where neutral is bonded to it. That's a ground fault.

Or you can call it an unexpected-current-through-ground-to-neutral-protection-device, but that's even more of a mouth-full than GFCI.

Yes, we talk semantics here when the WORDS are defined by the electrical code.

CIRCUIT BREAKER as a specific definition in the code that says it opens at a predetermined overcurrent rating. You can weasel all you want, but it is INCORRECT to call a device without the OCD function a circuit breaker.

If GFCI or AFCI is combined with the OCD, then you do have a circuit breaker. If it is elsewhere, it is technically, legally, and practically NOT a circuit breaker.

I said nothing about "labelling". I said the hand testers may not give you the full picture because they perform a different approximation of the test function than the test button on the GFCI itself.

Again, you demonstrate your ignorance. The current doesn't have to return to ground to trip a GFCI. It just has to go somewhere other than back to the GFCI. The common example is that it touches a DIFFERENT circuit than the one on the load side of the GFCI.

I don't know what your comments about multiple circuits and MWBC, we VERY MUCH do care about issues with them. Indeed a GFCI also detects when the grounded conductor side of it (what is commonly called the neutral) touches some other circuit (grounded or otherwise).

I wasn't griping about the naming of a GFCI, was griping about your erroneous and dangerously misleading statements in your other post.

Ron, excellent post

Matches my experience and training perfectly!