[Paul Moss]

Unless they have been a good customer, I would agree with Doug and Tony and fight it.

[jim mca]

Where the carpet has delaminated would the backing not still be glued to the underlay if they have glued it down my instinct is they have pulled it up and its came apart now looking for a scapegoat
I would contact the NCCA even if you are not a member they should help put you in touch with a independent carpet inspector arrange for the inspection to take place and ask for the fitters details as if the inspector finds the problem has been caused by someone else you will be looking to be reimbursed for the cost of the inspection also join the NCCA  

[Tony Rowley]

If there is one thing I cannot abide its bullies, reasonable people I am more liable to consider in a compassionate way but when he said that if the insurance doesnt pay then he will pursue me that really annoyed me. He also suggested that I should pay for a replacement pretty much on the spot and then try to claim the money back from my insurance!! like thats gonna work!

I am considering my response to him as I said I would email him but will be taking my time to word it the way I want it to come across so he clearly understands.

You know when someone tries to be really smart even though they dont have much knowledge? yep he is one of those.

Thanks again for all your input, you've been vary helpful and I will keep you updated on developements.

Tony

[tony bish]

Jim I think the glueing was done at the edges and not all over ...I dont think any fitter would glue all over with underlay and gripper underneath as there would be no point ,but you are right the backing would come of if that was the case ,but the underlay would be pulled apart also .
I dont think the fitter who fitted the door bar is at fault as he has just said what he sees and cant for a min think he would  pull all that carpet up to do a door bar or if he saw it was wet even, you would see delamination on the edge of the carpet when you do a door bar in fact it is probably the area worst affected for obvious reasons,how many times do we see carpet coming out of door bars and carpet is knackered, and I would suspect he mentioned this to said ass*hole and he put two and two together and came up with scam ( sorry did I say that ,well wash my mouth out ) ,I believe the guy did that and dare I say it had a hand in the damp problem also .
As I said before delamination does not happen instantaneously if carpet is in proper condition and given the time scale off incident I would say highly unlikely . There are many on this forum who are skilled in flood work,I dont and am no expert , but they have taken up carpet which has been submerged in water and the backing is still operational .   

[Shaun_Ashmore]

Derek Bolton has good knowledge of how trading standards work he sometimes looks in on here.

Shaun

[Hilton]

Well well well,
So it is on crumb, pretty much what I suspected I hope you did not accept any liability.

By the way bonding carpet to to this type of underlay is not unusual and is the recommended method when using Duralay System 10, so pulling the carpet away from around edges could result in it pulling the secondary backing away, I am not sure why they would have done this though..

In case you are wondering I used to do carpet inspections for major stores including John Lewis which I am sure you know have their own range and use their own appointed fitters.this does not look anything like the quality they would sell..are you sure the invoice is genuine ? Does it say including fitting.?

If I was still in the game I would to take this one on..

[Simon Gerrard]

Tony,
I too hate people that think they can bully you into paying for something that probably isn't your fault , by threatening to take you to the Small Claims Court. Taking you to court is one thing, winning is quite another as they will have to convince the court that this problem was your fault. Your job is to be in a position to cast as much doubt upon that as possible and that shouldn't be difficult as this case hinges on one simple point - that you couldn't reasonably have foreseen this issue in advance of cleaning the carpet, which the client engaged you to do and given that you couldn't have known this issue would arise, then it could be argued that it is actually the clients fault and that he should have checked with the manufacturer to get guidelines on how to clean this carpet and passed them on to you.
The other thing is that it is not unreasonable for a carpet to hang together through the process of cleaning it and the fact that it has delaminated in places is surely down to a manufacturing fault.

You say you are going to write to him and put your position.....don't!
Write to him and acknowledge his complaint and say that following your recent visit on XX day at XX time you intend to obtain specialist advice from a qualified carpet inspector.
Next, take Hilton up on his offer or get someone he knows about these things to go and take a look.

Simon

[DB]

A lot of advice here to take in...I would like to make several points if I may..

1 in an earlier post I intimated that the wet area looked to be more than over wetting i.e. a leak of some sort

2. Delamination... I have seen new carpets  being loaded onto a fitters van delaminating as the roll is being maneuvered onto the vehicle.

3. Latex glue used to secure the secondary backing to the primary backing does not, to my knowledge, have to meet any British Standard therefore its manufacture can be inconsistant. To bulk the glue a China clay is used and its when this dries out (crumbles to dust) any likely delamination present can escalate.

4. Trading Standards...why not have a word with them...after all we all pay taxes and have a right to call on their services.... they can be very helpful. Allied Carpets used to follow this route in awkward situations to good effect

5. Something else crossed my mind... if a fitter has been playing around... couldn't the 'last person to touch it syndrome be applicable'?

I hope this is useful....Good luck

[clinton]

tony just on another side linked to your post I cleaned a carpet for a client before xmas and she had a carpet from john lewis and when it did arrive to be fitted the carpet was delaminated...

Just shows this can happen at any time of supplier.

good luck with this by the way.

[Ian Gourlay]

Tony what sort of Guarantee do you give


On the other hand a cleaner round my way who offered a Money nack Guarantee told the client to go and F..ck her carpet

[tony bish]

Did you get this sorted Tony .

[John Kelly]

Having lifted many carpets due to water and fire damage I have seen this many times. Sometimes even when the carpet has been saturated delamination hasn't occurred. However they do delaminate when wet for a long period. I have normally found this in the traffic lanes especially the footfall area just in the doorways. Most of these were cold water leaks so I imagine hot water would increase the risk. I have also seen this many times when lifting carpets which hadn't been wetted. Obviously this was due to friction due to wear.
In this instance I would be reluctant to accept responsibility as it appears that the damage is along the edge of the carpet where it has been stretched onto the door bar and gripper. If over wetting had been the cause why was the damage not more widespread.
If you are convinced you did not over wet then I would just put it in writing that the carpets were cleaned using industry standard methods which would not cause the damage highlighted. I would also mention that he told you his son had urinated. I bet they wouldn't have just left that but would probably have used a lot of water to wash it out.
Let him then take it further which would put the onus on him to prove you caused the damage. The carpet fitters word would not be enough to do this unless he was qualified in carpet inspections which I doubt.

[Tony Rowley]

Well to cut a long story short(and I am leaving out a fair bit of detail deliberately at this point) I continued to deny responsibility and suggested other reasons for the delamination, pointing out that it had only happened where the fitter had lifted the carpet but to no avail, he is/was still insistant that I was the only possible cause for the damage and if I didnt pay up he would claim (through the court) not only for that carpet but for another much older carpet that I had cleaned and he now said was damaged! Not really into blackmail and you just cannot reason with some people so he has been told that, as John has just pointed out, the onus is on him to prove my responsibility for the damage.

That was about a week ago and I await any further response from him and expect something to drop through the letter box any day and we will see what happens from there!

Thanks again for all your comments and help and if anything further happens I will let you know how it turns out.

Tony

[tony bish]

Well good luck mate, lets hope he crawls back under the stone he came out from .........and keep us posted 

[DB]

If the fitter has lifted the carpet then I reckon the 'last person to touch it syndrome' could apply... see previous post