Couple Are Crushed by Carpet Warranty
With warranties, the fine print means a lot.
Often, the buyer of a product believes that any defect will be covered. But when the warranty is invoked, the producer may cite restrictive language--often in small print--or other reasons for declining to honor the guarantee.
Irate consumers recently told me of two such cases, and I checked into both. My findings confirmed my long-held belief that warranties frequently are oversold.
In the first case, last September, a Fullerton couple purchased 165 yards of a new Mohawk deep cut pile carpet for their home for $4,355 and received about six weeks later a “5 Year Limited Crush Resistance Warranty.”
The husband wrote Mohawk CEO Jeffrey Lorberbaum in Calhoun, Ga., on Dec. 30 that “at the time of order I very specifically asked whether this carpet would . . . retain the appearance of the showroom sample, or whether it would show footprints. . . .
“I was assured by the salesperson, Mr. Paul Mooney, that . . . the carpet would remain as in the sample, and . . . if there was any problem . . . due to the crush resistance guarantee, the company would stand behind it. . . .
“Almost immediately, we noticed that footprints were very noticeable and that they did not disappear in a reasonable time, as it was represented to us.”
So he invoked the warranty.
But Elizabeth Gregory, Mohawk’s consumer affairs coordinator, responded Jan. 8:
“When a product is manufactured from a soft textile fiber that will be walked on . . . footprints will occur. . . . [They] are not a defect, but a normal characteristic . . . [so] Mohawk will be unable to offer . . . assistance on this claim.”
And, in another letter Jan. 29, Gregory drove the point home by quoting the warranty:
“This warranty excludes such conditions as footprints or shading, changes in texture, crushing from the placement of furniture, installation on stairs, abuse, improper installation or maintenance.”
But, the husband asks, if all these things are excluded, just what does the crush resistance warranty include?
He said that in a test, a footprint was still visible in the carpet 60 days after he walked on it.
The couple asked me not to use their names. The wife said she worried Mohawk might sue them.
But Mohawk’s general counsel, Sal Perillo, said it wouldn’t.
But as to what the crush resistance warranty does cover, Perillo cited Gregory’s letter, which also quoted the warranty as saying that the carpet should be “capable of retaining at least 90% of its original pile thickness when your excess unused carpet sample is tested in accordance with [fiber manufacturer] Allied Signal’s crush resistance test procedures.”
This is mumbo jumbo. The husband’s question hasn’t been answered.
Perillo suggested the footprints would vanish as soon as the couple vacuumed their carpet.
To this, the wife responded, “We’re well aware that when we vacuum the carpet, the footprints disappear. But every time we step on it, there are new footprints. And you don’t carry a vacuum around behind you every minute.”
Mooney, the Anaheim seller of the carpet, denied he said anything about it not showing footprints.
“I don’t know how any average person can expect a carpet not to show a footprint when you step on it,” he said.
Mooney said he had paid $75 to send an inspector to the home, who concluded the carpet is good.
The couple is very unhappy, but I wonder if their expectations for this warranty were too high.
In the second case, Susan Tellem of Malibu bought a manual Hoffritz can opener for $25 about eight years ago. She says it came with a “lifetime guarantee.”
But when it became damaged last summer and she shipped it to Hoffritz and asked for a replacement, she got a terse letter back, along with the old can opener, denying her claim.
“Your opener was purchased from the original Hoffritz who went out of business some years ago,” said the letter signed by Sandra Hunter for the company.
“Lifetime Hoan Corporation purchased the Hoffritz name and created a brand new high-quality line to go with it. We will stand behind our products at all times, but we cannot repair any merchandise acquired prior to our acquisition of the Hoffritz name.”
Still, when I called Hoffritz, it promptly agreed to send Tellem a new $21.99 can opener free.
Spokeswoman Christina Bevacqua emphasized Hoffritz was “not under any legal obligation” to replace the old can opener. It was doing so, she said, in “hope her experience with us will be favorable, so in the future she’ll buy more Hoffritz products.”
But, I asked, what about other warranty claimants? Would they also get a free can opener?
No, Bevacqua replied. Actually, she said, the New York firm of International Cutlery now “owns the business part of Hoffritz and we bought the brand name.” She imagined they would be responsible for product failures.
But when I reached Joel Silver, president of International Cutlery and former executive VP of the old Hoffritz, he said that wasn’t right either. The old Hoffritz went bankrupt, he said, and his company is not responsible for its obligations.
Besides, Silver said, Tellem had it wrong. Any such guarantee would have been only for material and manufacturing defects.
“Hoffritz stood behind its products, within reason, but not everything, absolutely not forever,” Silver said. “It’s not realistic to think as this lady is thinking.”
Nonetheless, Tellem expressed delight that the new Hoffritz was sending her a new can opener.
In other words, some of these warranty situations seem a little fluid--an invitation to negotiation rather than a declaration of principle--and assertiveness has its place.
Ken Reich can be contacted with your accounts of true consumer adventure at (213) 237-7060 or by e-mail at: ken.reich@latimes.com
