[the red carpet]

oh well just shrunk my first carpet.

it was a belgium wilton so i guess i shouldnt be to suprised, but i have cleaned 4 of these before with no problem so thought as long as i took my usual precations i would be safe,

turned down the temp.
turned down the pump.
only one cleaning pass.
turbo dryed.

but it didnt work this time within minutes of cleaning i could see the carpet rucking up and coming away from the edges in certain places it hasent all come away but in a few areas it has come of the gripper, i think one of the main causes of the shrinkage may be the fitting as im sure i remember reading that these should be fitted with double gripper, and in the place it has come away its just single gripper and the worst part is near the door were it just has the door bar thing holding it down.

anyway i have left the turbo drier on to totaly dry the carpet and luckily there is a carpet fitter going to lay a carpet in the other room later today so hopefully he will be able to kick it back onto the runner, i  know iv heard people on here say leave it 72 hours before trying to refit but as its not that bad and i am using a dryer and hes gonna be there anyway im gonna give it a try.

what im not sure of is if i should be paying for the refit or the customer if it is down to bad fitting.
im hoping the carpet fitter wont charge a lot and suggesting to the customer that we halve the bill

[Neil Grainger]

Hi Red

Did you warn of possible shrinkage with this carpet so you a.se is covered.

I always tell customers about the posibility of shrinkage with BW as its such a lottery.

Hope it all work out for you and you are not stung for to much money.

Cheers

Neil

[BRSL]

Hi Red

Im amazed your still going for payment good for you, I always run a 100% monney back garentee so if there not happy they dont pay, but I would think you wil end up with the bill for re fitting but most people work for foreiners (apart from us hay  ) just hope she's a understanding lady, and it sounds like you took all the right precautions good luck

[the red carpet]

hi neil,
i sort of warned her, what actually happened was i went round to do a quote and at the time of the quote i thought that the carpet was a b/w but couldnt find anywere to lift a bit to look at the backing, so anyway gave the customer a price to clean carpets but did tell her that it was subject to me checking the carpet first if she decided to go ahead as i was worried about the possibility of shrinking it.

anyway got the call to go back and do the work a couple of weeks later and went back today, checked the backing and it was a b/w but it was so clean anyway no marks or nothing that i thought i would get away with it as i would have to use so little water and i had the turbo dryer going.

just wish i had said to her today that it was up to her if she wanted me to clean it or not as it had the potential to shrink

[the red carpet]

hi pile profile.
i would also not expect a customer to pay if they were not happy.
but i have done work for this customer before and she knows my work is good,she was willing to pay me today but i told her i wouldnt accept payment untill the problem was sorted, i did warn her about the possibility of shrinkage and i did take all precautions against it, also i have told her that i accept responsibility but have pointed out that the carpet was not fitted properly and in a way she is lucky that she has chosen somone like myself to do the work as i spotted the potential for the carpet to shrink and did all i could to prevent it.
imagine if she had a splash and dash £10 a room cleaner with no training overwet it im sure it would look like a rug by now.

just hope i can get away with giving the carpet cleaner £20-£30 as hes there anyway.

[Chris R]

Did it re-stretch?

Be very surprised if it did, so soon. They usually need a day or two to loosen up.

When a belgium wilton comes off the door strip its usually very bad news.

good luck, I only use dry fusion on them now ( since having to buy a new one for a customer a few years ago )

Chris

[the red carpet]

well the carpet fitter has done me no favours.

he has told the customer that the carpet is a right of and you cannot restretch any carpet once shrunk and also it will continue to shrink for a while yet and get a lot worst, he also told her that you cannot ever wet clean any axminsters or wiltons as they will all definatly shrink and bassicaly i should have known better. he also told her there was nothing wrong with the fitting as there all fitted like that and i was probably just using this as a excuse to try and get out of it

as you can imagine she is now not very impressed

anyway i have spoke to another carpet fitter and he reckons providing it hasnt shrunk to much it shouldnt be a problem to refit it at a cost of around £35 so i have advised customer to wait 72 hours and then let this guy have a go

[Robert Watson]

Hi Danuel, I feel so sorry for you The fitters got some bad stuff going on in his head. Don`t let it get to you. You have a good Christmas.
Rabby.

[Buster Ingram]

Don't worry I have never seen a wilton NOT GO BACK yet.  In 20 odd yrs of cleaning they have followed me out the room and 2 days later they right as rain. You have to leave them to return on their own . IT WILL.
The Indians love them here in Wolverhampton every time I have shrunk one they say " Oh deary me"

[John Kelly]

There are carpet fitters and carpets fitters, this one is obviously a prat. Belgian Wilton need to fitted to british standards which means having double gripper around the perimeter, I haven't seen one yet fitted in this way (could be a get out clause for you). Get your self a good fitter on board, hopefully he won't get too much work from you but when he does make it worth his while. Finding a good fitter isn't easy probably talking to other cleaners is a good way to find one.
Unfortunately it is very hard to stretch back a Belgian Wilton, thats why they are such a pain. Proper Wilton and especially Axminsters usually stretch back ok. We done a flooded one recently £3,500. Ex carpet fitter who worked there tut tutted and said you'll never stretch that back. DID!

[BRSL]

dont let it spoil your christmas 

explain to her that her carpet fitter is full of S*** and hope for the best

Good luck

James

[Steve Weatherley]

So what is the easiest way to identify a BW from a normal Wilton?

[John_Flynn]

Wilton as made in England is 100% wool or maybe 80/20.

B/W is Sympathetic!! (synthetic), No I was right 1st time!!!

[Steve Weatherley]

Thats how I was taught how to identify them aswell. However Red Carpet mentioned that he looked at the backing and was able to identify it as a BW?
What would be significant about the backing that would help identify these carpets?

[the red carpet]

belgiums are synthetic man made fibre's, also i belive most are heavily patterned and if you look at the backing of the carpet the pattern is still clear.

spoke to my customer today and thankfully it hasnt got any worse.

so i think its of the door bar by about half a inch, of the gripper in a few places but not pulled in just sort of rucked up a bit, and stretched tight on the gripper in one spot its still held to the gripper but you can see were its contracted as its come away from the skirting a bit.

shes agreed to wait till thursday or friday and let me get a fitter in to give it a try so fingers crossed

[woodman]

I followed this thread with interest and note what others have said regarding the fitting,the fitter and the cleaning.

The simple conclusion is I'm afraid, it is your fault that the carpet shrunk.

A proper inspection would have for-warned you that it was a BW you can do this with out lifting it a simple burn test would have been sufficient to show it's a polyprop.It also would have revealed the poor fitting which you could have high lighted to the client before starting the cleaning.

As such it would have been apparant that this was a 'walk away' or LM clean only.

I agree the fitters have been no help at all and got in first with her on the accusations front ,which always tips the balance in their favour when it comes to trying to convince her otherwise.

Of course it's nonsense that no Axi's or Wilton can be wet cleaned but this isn't either so the onus is always on us as the professionals to make the right call.

You might get lucky and stretch it back ( but I doubt this)  but the gripper will have to be properly fitted now to hold it, which pobably means drill & plugging this is where you can show her how they bodged the fitting.Unlike John I have seen BW double edged fitted on many occasions and you may need now to do this to hold it.

I wish you well but if at the end of the day it all goes wrong, hold your hands up, dig out your insurance and get it replaced for her, it's cheap tat anyway so it won't cost much and you will have redeemed yourself some what in your clients eyes.

Good Luck

[Chris Bailey]

Go with Woodman on this, even qualifying before cleaning probably wouldn't have made a diffence if it went legal, you are a proffesional, you knew the risks before cleaning it yet you still cleaned it! - your liability... question is will your insurance company pay up OR will they say no way, it shrank through your neglect...

Worse case of course.

If BW'shave to be fitted to British Standards then there will be a British Standard somewhere for it!  If you need to demonstrate the I.Q. of the first carpet fitter then this would be a good starting point.

I have hwe'd in the past, thankfully without any problems, but I like to LM when I can.

The important thing is to redeem yourself with your client so that you get work in the future...  At what cost though!

Chris

[the red carpet]

hi guys,
woodman i did check the carpet before i cleaned and did  relise it was a b/w, with regards to the fitting it all seemed to be fitted well enough to me at first wasnt loose anywere so i decided to go ahead with caution as iv never had a problem before. As you say i took the risk and it backfired so its now my problem.

i dont think its worth me going down the insurance route if i do have to replace as i have a £500 excess.

Anybody have any idea how much the carpet would be worth? i dont know the measurements but its a standard sized lounge.

thinking back the way the carpet has been fitted its sort of tucked over/rolled over at the edges and then fitted to the gripper, i dont know what this is called, but it seems an inch or two tucked under. so thinking about it the carpet is in affect 2-4 inches longer each way than the room, so even if  the fittercant stretch it back onto the gripper, would he not be able to take it up and relay the whole thing.

[Michel Roberts]

All Carpets including BWs should be fitted to british standards.

In practice very few are

The british standard for carpet installation is BS 5235-2001 Code of practice for the installation of textile floorcoverings

Red Carpet I don t really understand what you mean by the carpet being rolled under/tucked over by an inch or two. The only way I can imagine this is if the gripper was fitted that sort of distance away from the skirting board which would be very wrong, but maybe I'm not understanding you correctly

Michel

[the red carpet]

as i say the edges are folded under so that instead of the gripper rod fixing to the underside of the carpet it is actually attatched to the face of the carpet,
(the carpet has not been cut flush to the skirting board) its hard to try and explain but if you can imagine were it is fixed to the gripper its actually the thickness of two layers of carpet

[John_Flynn]

Get your hand in your pocket and pay her out remebering to deduct for the wear that she has already had out of the original carpet, also you replace the carpet NOT the gripper and underlay!!

Then get on with your life and stop worrying, STRESS never did anybody any good.

[Dave_Lee]

This type of fitting a carpet was extremely common over 20 years ago when gripper rods became more commonly used. A lot of fitters were fitting the carpets in the same way as ring and pin fitting and laying the gripper an inch or so back from the skirting board. This gap was filled by hemming the carpet, usually bonded by adhesive. In those days it was because the fitters concerned just couldnt get away from what they had always done - turning the edge and hemming. Unfortunatly when wrongly using this method with gripper rods, the carpet is not secure, just merely sitting on top of the gripper and easilly lifted off. This method of fitting is always bad news when it comes to cleaning, but when its also a B/W it a no, no. give it a WEEK before trying a restretch on to double gripper and trimming OFF the hemm with a normal compression fit.
Dave

[the red carpet]

thanks for that Dave
oh well at least iv got somthing out of the situation i wont be making the same mistake again,
and even if i do end up having to put my hand in my pocket i can use this as a learning experience i wont be touching anything im not 100% about if its fitted in this manor again.

Daniel

[Len Gribble]

Daniel

You are not alone I’ve shrunk one and it did go back with the right preparation  and later with the right tool and not only with a knee kicker and they paid me extra for a job well done, totally gob smacked!!

Regardless of type of carpet and if fitted correctly or not, I wonder how many people lift to hide cables (guilty my lord) is it fitted back correctly I think so??? But will wait till I have it cleaned!!

Is there a British standard for the claw of the knee kicker (draft marks)

Len

[conallon]

Red, your looking around 100 poundish plus fitting for replacement,some of these guys are well convincing me it can be put right,that carpet fitter sounds a right w----- ,see if you can get a copy of the british carpet fitting standards,maybe off the net.

good luck Con

[Steve Weatherley]

With regard to John Flynn's comment about replacing the carpet but deducting an amount to take into account previous wear and tear on the carpet....................

In principle I agree with John but wonder how the customer feels if she has to shell out some cash to have the carpet replaced. After all, she wanted it cleaned (not replaced at extra expense to her).

Maybe one way of resolving this would be to replace the carpet but deduct the price you had initially quoted to do the clean. this way she has a new carpet at the same price she agreed to pay.

I wish you good luck - put it down as a learning experience, in the long run this extra knowledge will save you money.

Best regards

Steve

[the red carpet]

yes i agree i wouldnt dream of deducting money for wear and tear as this will do nothing for customer relations she would almost certainly never use or recomend me again, i am going to try to get the carpet refited and if no joy will have to either refund her for carpet or arrange a replacement.
Once the situation is resolved either way i will still be expecting payment from her as she was willing to pay in the first place for a cleaner carpet and she will end up with either a cleaner carpet or a brand new one so she has no reason to be anything other than satisfied.

one question i did ask guys wich nobody seems to have answered - anybody know how much would this carpet cost to replace?

Daniel

[Steve Weatherley]

sorry I don't know how much........just pop into your local carpet shop to get a price per metre sq.

[Chris R]

With regard to deductions for wear and tear.

Did you know that if you did claim on your insurance, for this or any other damaged carpet or suite, THEY WOULD DEDUCT MONEY FOR WEAR AND TEAR!!
The only insurance that pays out new for old is domestic house insurance.(competition between insurance companys for your business is the reason why)

All commercial policys pay out to the value of the item at the time it was damaged.

If you crash and write off your 5 year old van would you expect the insurance to buy you a brand spanking new one!!

So if you shrink a 10 year old carpet the customer will be paid to the value of a 10 year old carpet!

I assume that this will stand up in a court of law, so if you do have to pay out, and considering that she will never recomend or use you again anyway, WHY PAY THE FULL PRICE?

Chris

ps If the room is about 15 x12 I would think £300 to replace + fitting

pps having re-read my own posting, and if, in this case, it does only cost about £300 to replace it with a new one, I would pay the £300. But,,,,,,,,, if it was a claim for £2000,,,,,I would deduct for wear and tear ! 

[John_Flynn]

OH heck Mr R, at last we agree.

But still would not have wasted so much money!!

Vorsprung De Technic  : : :

[the red carpet]

CHEERS CHRIS IF ITS WORTH £2000 IM GONNA DO A RUNNER  

SERIOUSLY THOUGH I SEE NO REASON FOR HER TO NOT USE ME AGAIN IF I HAD SOMBODY TRY AND CLEAN SOMTHING FOR ME AND THEY MENTIONED THAT IT MAY SHRINK AND THEN I SAW THEY TOOK EVERY PRECATIONS AGAINST IT, AND THE WORST DID HAPPEN AS LONG AS THEY SORTED OUT THE PROBLEM FOR ME QUICKLY I WOULD BE VERY HAPPY AND WOULD HAVE NO PROBLEM RECCOMENDING THEM ESPECIALLY IF I GOT A NEW CARPET OUT OF IT.
IN FACT I WOULD ASK THEM BACK TO CLEAN THE WHOLE HOUSE IN THE HOPE THEY WOULD SHRINK SOME MORE.

AT THE END OF THE DAY IF IT COSTS ME £300 ITS ONE OF THEM THINGS IV HAD £186 OUT OF HER LAST WEEK ANYHOW

[the red carpet]

THANKS CONRAD,
JUST REREAD THIS THREAD AND SAW YOUR POST I DIDNT NOTICE IT EARLIER AND THERE WAS ME SAYING NOBODY HAD COME BACK TO ME WITH A PRICE, THANKS

DANIEL

[John_Flynn]

Have you already been paid for the job???

If you have, that money will go towards the cost of the New Carpet!!

If you have not been paid you must ask the customer for the money the cleaning would have cost, after all she has now got a CLEAN new carpet.

If possible visit a PROPER carpet warehouse tell them you are trade and buy the carpet from tham and arrange your own fitting DO NOT LET HER GO TO ONE OF THE CARPET BARNS !!!, or you will get a right hiding!!!

[John Kelly]

Anybody wanting to find the price of a carpet try this site http://www.storeycarpets.co.uk/

Obviously doesn't have every carpet and prices will vary in different regions but a good starting point.
Use the carpet search.

[Doug Holloway]

Hi Red,

Two things spring to mind.

Firstly this customer is very unlikely to come back to you in the future , unfortunately you will always be the guy who shrank the carpet.

Secondly I notice on another thread that you always use a powerbrush.I would suggest a wand will give much more control over wetting.

Cheers

Doug

[the red carpet]

hi doug,

Thanks for your advice i have to say though i am suprised by it.
I find the scrubba leaves the carpets much dryer and i always get comments from my customers about how dry i leave the carpets compared to there last cleaner, i even use this as a selling point that i leave the carpets just damp and virtually dry.

Also in the extracta broucher, one of the selling points of the scrubba is that it leaves your customers carpets dryer as less cleaning passes are required meaning less cleaning solution is used meaning dryer carpets.

Daniel

[Ian Hare]

One of the selling points for every seller of every piece of cc kit is that it will leave the carpet drier!
Make your own mind up don't believe the sales spiel.

[John Kelly]

Regardless of how dry you leave the carpet, the problem with Belgian Wiltons is because of the design the water goes straight through the Polyprop face fibres into the backing. You could extract every last molecule of water but it wouldn't matter as the damage is already done.
The design of a power brush is such that the water is in contact with the carpet for slightly longer in order for the brush to agitate before the wand section extracts.
A wand extracts almost immediately.

[Prestige1]

I only clean the odd carpet no where near as many as you guys. it may sound simple to you guys but whats the best way to tell if its a Belgian Wilton? your help will be appreciated.
kind regards Phil

[John Kelly]

Phil

Go to this website http://www.storeycarpets.co.uk/ go to the carpet search facility. tick heavy patterned and woven boxes.
Here you will find a myriad of this type of carpet. Unfortunately they are also making plain ones now.
To identify them, turn a corner over and if there are white cotton strands running through the backing beware.
However the problem is the Polyprop face fibre which allows the water to reach the backing. On genuine wool carpets you still need to be carefull however the wool captures the water preventing it going through to the backing.
You need to do a burn test to distinquish the fibres. Handy to carry a little tin with a lighter and some tweezers. Also find a burn test guide off one of the websites, print out and glue this to the tin as a handy reference.
Wool smells like burnt hair and Polyprop smells like tar or burning plastic. Find a peice of each material and burn it to become familiar. Also don't forget those plain ones, always check the backing on every carpet.

[the red carpet]

Had to go back to job today to collect dryer,
and to my suprise the carpet has gone virtually back to normal on its own all the rucking up seems to have flattened and were the carpet was about half inch of the doorbar its relaxed back and is now just touching it  still needs to be stretched a bit and tucked back under but i think thats about it so hopefully should have no problems getting a fitter to sort it in the new year.

Even if it wont stretch its so close to the door i should be able get away with just fitting a slightly thicker door bar.

And i got paid

So lessons learned
Watch out for this type of fitting
always warn customers of dangers and let them know its up to them if they want to take the risk
and if the worse does happen give it a good few days to dry and relax back

[John_Flynn]

Now you need to go round and sort that D i c k Head of a fitter out who filled your clients head with a load of Testicles!!

[BRSL]

Well said John 

Oh well Christams luck seems to be passing around quickly now so make sure every one you grab a slice.

Happy Christmas Dan 1 less thing to worry about

And a good & Prosperous New Year to all the C I U possy !!!!!!!!!

James 

[Buster Ingram]

Red carpet I told you it would go back it just needs time. Thats the trouble when a carpet shrinks everyone panicks and no one thinks straight, customer blames you you blame fitting and hey in 5 days alls well.
Now go and have a happy Xmas
Have a look at this then make up your own minds which is the best ways to clean this type of carpet?

http://www.cleanfax.com/HowTo.asp?H_ID=1487

For me Its HWE with a Green glide fitted to my wand.
Dave

[Prestige1]

John
Many thanks for the advice. it's really appreciated. kind regards Phil