Floor fiasco

pinkshoes

Ordered flooring from a flooring shop.

They came to the house, measured up, we agreed a price, and I paid the flooring cost. They said the fitting cost was not negotiable and I needed to pay their fitter on the day either cash or bank transfer.

I phoned the flooring shop and booked a day for it to be fitted. The floor was fitted (wooden floor over boarded with ply then vinyl glued down). Happy me. Fitter paid.

An hour later, the floor (vinyl and boards) started raising up. Shop notified immediately.

A week later, the floor was taken up and a new floor re-fitted. They spent AGES making sure the ply board was well hammered down. An hour later, up pops the floor. I notified the shop the next morning.

The flooring shop seems to be blaming their fitter. The fitter is experienced, has fitted this floor many times before, and has no idea why it is failing.

Now what????

I am at a loss of what to do or expect next. Do I have to give them a third chance to put it right? Can I demand they take the whole thing out and issue a full refund? Does the shop have to refund the FULL amount (including the cost of the fitter)?

I have no kitchen, my entire house is filled with the old kitchen (it has all our stuff in it!!) as well as the new kitchen and huge dining table, and the school holidays are about to start.

Just ARGH!

MB69

So it is vinyl that you have bought or is it wooden floor?

What room is it in? Kitchen?

If it is plywood to be fitted to the wooden floor to make perfect surface for vinyl, then why not screw the plywood to the wooden floor rather than hammering it in?

But of course the fitter knows best.

When did you buy the flooring and when did they fit it?

under consumer law, you have 30 days to reject it if the quality is not good. After 30 days, then they can offer to fix it up to 6 months and ...

But within 30 days, you can reject it as unfit for purpose and get your full money back specially as they have already tired to fix it twice!

But seriously, why vinyl? You can get laminate which is a lot better quality nowadays than they used to be and they look better

pinkshoes

MB69 wrote: »

So it is vinyl that you have bought or is it wooden floor?

What room is it in? Kitchen?

If it is plywood to be fitted to the wooden floor to make perfect surface for vinyl, then why not screw the plywood to the wooden floor rather than hammering it in?

But of course the fitter knows best.

When did you buy the flooring and when did they fit it?

under consumer law, you have 30 days to reject it if the quality is not good. After 30 days, then they can offer to fix it up to 6 months and ...

But within 30 days, you can reject it as unfit for purpose and get your full money back specially as they have already tired to fix it twice!

But seriously, why vinyl? You can get laminate which is a lot better quality nowadays than they used to be and they look better

Kitchen and tough vinyl.

Ordered mid June and first fitted just over a week ago.

Ply HAS been screwed in places second time round. Hubby did it. Fitter is not allowed to do it in case pipes are below the floor!!

Why vinyl? Three kids and two dogs, so heavy foot/paw fall through the kitchen. I wanted continuous smooth flooring with no joins that can be swept and cleaned quickly with steam mop. This is posh heavy duty vinyl and looks amazing (other than the raised sections!!). I didn't want any of the click together floors.

MB69

Well ifr you are not happy with it, then you have 30 days to let them know that it is not fit for purpose.

You have given them a chance twice and they haven't sorted it out.

robatwork

Suspect it's those shoes - high heels can play havoc with vinyl.

Fosterdog

My guess would be the fitter is taking you for a ride, if he was that experience he would know why it's lifting and would know ways to fix it, also when he said he can't use screws because of pipes but can hammer nails in to the same places screws could go? How does that even work? A professional fitter would know how to work out where the pipes are and would work around them to nail or screw down any bits that need it.

Personally I'd get a second opinion from another fitter

[Deleted User]

Sounds to me its a fitter problem too. To be sure of success the fitter should be laying all parts of the flooring, including the panel underfloor.

Was the actual floor uneven to need panelling applied over it? This could be a reason for the failure.

ComicGeek

It could be that the vinyl wasn't acclimatised to the temp and humidity in the kitchen before laying - it's always recommended to leave it in the room for 24hrs before fitting, but difficult when the fitter just turns up with it and starts immediately. If it's been left in a hot vehicle/warehouse overnight and then installed on a cool floor it will shrink, perhaps pulling up the ply if it's been glued really well in places

MB69

Well you would expect after the first repair, it will be ok the second time as it has been sitting there for the duration climatizing.

pinkshoes

The underflooring is just floor boards. 1980s built, so not wonky. They said it needed overboarding.

The vinyl sat (in the baking heat) on my front lawn before fitting!!

There is a possibility the wrong glue was used twice as this is a modern and rather heavy duty vinyl. (We managed to get a flooring fried to come and take a look).

I am going to agree to them re-fitting it a third time but only if it is completed before the end of next week.

photome

Sure there was no need to fry the flooring.

Sounds like a fitting issue