This column is longer than normal and I’ll tell you why. I’m angry, very angry. I have been helping retail dealers resolve their claims problems for well over 30 years. I work on some of the largest commercial carpet and floor covering claims in existence. I live, sleep, eat, and breathe this business to the marrow of my bones and the depth of my soul. And no one spends more of their time learning about this product on a daily basis from the people who make, than I do. When someone has the audacity to say that I am not credible, which means I am not believable, trustworthy, honest and sincere about what I do because the analysis and determination I make on a carpet concern is not what they want to hear or they simply don’t know the technical aspects of the product, is despicable. Because they want to deny the retailers claim they have to attack the information blaming their manufacturing processes. They also want to discredit the individual who knows, without question, based on the irrefutable evidence exhibited by the carpet, that they’re compromising their products. This is fact, the carpet never lies, and it will always tell you what’s wrong if you know how to interpret what its saying. Just like a dead body will yield the cause of death so too will a carpet yield the cause for a complaint. People lie, but the carpet does not and will not, ever.

Let me share this perfect example with you of a report written for a retail dealer who had the claim denied on this particular product after it was inspected. Remember, this could be you and probably has been more times than you care to admit. So put yourself in this dealers position as you read this. By the way, this product complaint is from the same manufacturer whose claims person made the dastardly comments about my credibility.

The complaint on the installed carpet is for matting and texture loss. An unused sample of the complaint carpet was sent in to us along with individual tuft samples from the affected areas, the independent inspection report, the mills denial letter and all the pertinent paperwork that went with this claim. The tuft samples from the traffic areas exhibited blossoming, some severe untwisting and filament extension to the point of making the yarn completely separated. The unused sample of the carpet when examined contains yarn tufts with between four to six twists per tuft. In tufts throughout the carpet there are individual yarns with the top twist coming apart. This indicates a 20 to 25% untwisting of the yarn tip prior to being subjected to any traffic. The inspection report says the upper 10% of the yarn tuft is affected, which is not the case. All one need do is count the twists per yarn tuft to determine the percentage of ply separation.

There is also filament slippage in the carpet that will give the appearance of poor wear, and mask the defined texture of the carpet surface. This is a finishing defect. Yarns taken from the carpet randomly indicate no latex penetration into the yarn bundle. This is visibly evident and obvious and takes no expert to determine – you, the reader, could easily see this deficiency. The inherent untwisted yarn will, with traffic, separate further and cause matting and textural appearance change. Not all cut pile carpet will show tip blossoming as the inspection report suggested. Cut pile carpets with very tight twists and high heat set levels will retain their tip definition in traffic indefinitely. Cut pile carpets that are bulkier with lower twist levels and lower heat set levels will separate more and with greater ease. This is a physical characteristic built into a particular style of carpet.

The inspection report also stated that there is no abrasive fiber loss. This can’t possibly be known without extracting tufts from the traffic areas and counting the fiber ends and comparing them to tufts from unused areas and further examining them under magnification in an accredited lab. The inspector also states that there is no entanglement of blossomed tufts. In fact, the matting and appearance loss is being caused by the tip blossoming and entanglement of filaments slipping from the yarn and entangling. If it wasn’t there wouldn’t be matting and appearance loss of the carpet in the use areas as opposed to the traffic areas.

The tip blossoming in this product is inherent and excessive and will create the condition being complained about. The carpet is defective as a result of the inherent tip blossoming, ply separation and filament slippage. These are all manufacturing defects and deficiencies. Every one of these deficiencies is obvious and easy to see. To deny this condition is to either not understand carpet construction and technology or to make some excuse for denying the claim. We’re seeing a lot of this denial lately and a lot of deficiencies in carpet, especially in the finishing process relative to latex penetration. You’re probably starting to see more bad product yourself, if not you will. Strains on the economy of making the product will be reflected in the quality of what you get. You’ll also likely be getting more claims denied no matter who you are or what group you belong to, except maybe the big boxes. They’re big enough to push back with might, authority and capital – they are a big gorilla, dwarfing the manufacturers. Well, I’ll tell you this. You can have your own big gorilla, me, with the mighty power of the pen. The difference is that I really do know this product and the manufacturers know I do, which makes it very disconcerting to hear that one of their claims people made the statement about my credibility to a retail dealer. When the manufacturer is not to blame for a claim I’ll go to the wall for them as I would for every one of you or any of my clients. But when one of their claims people has to resort to assaulting my credibility to deny a legitimate claim irrefutably caused by them, that’s when the line gets crossed and I’m not the guy you want to do that to. Not only does the carpet not lie but I don’t either, ever. Remember that. Now, let’s get back to business.