OT? Specifying Furniture Colour

[Aidan Karley]

A warning tale for those who think they're wary enough (myself included)

Wanting a sofa-set. Various possible suppliers. Visit shops. Get swatches (and check that they're appropriate between one and another supplier, and confirm this from the shops) Think deeply, decide colours ("that" swatch, not this);

OK, we've decided a shop, a model, and a colour. We go in and spend a half hour sitting on the (model) example, waving the colour swatches under the nose of the salesman and saying "Sofa, this model, this" "colour ; armchair, this model this" waggle" colour. Blunt enough? No. Chair arrived in the right colour ; sofa arrived in wrong colour but right shape. Where did it go wrong?

We were talking to one salesman, waggling the swatches under his nose. He made notes, appropriately. I came in a few days later with a grand cash in my pocket (to get discount, which I got) and made the order with the sales manager (SM), using the salesdroid's(SD) notes. (I did check that the SM entered the SD's details, so SD got his commission). BUT ... SM mis-interpreted SD's notes and we ended up with a sofa in the default colour.

This is the first time I've tried ordering furniture ; after this fuss, it might be the last. When ordering, be very, very careful. Draw pictures and then colour them. In the picture, refer the crayons (hatching) you use to attached bits from your swatches. Write on the back of the swatch, so the factory manager can talk directly to you.

Be paranoid. The people you are working with probably want to help you, but may not have the info you need. Help them to help you. Can you wait a week for a letter to get from the shop to the factory? Then trim 1/3 of your swatch, cut it into bits, and WRITE YOUR NAME on it. 20 people might call it pink, but few are likely to call it Smith-Pink. Use an indelible pen.

FYI, the shop admitted to the problem, and have promised a replacement sofa in the colour we asked for. Still waiting for delivery (1 week; not a problem). Shop have been good about it (their fault) which is why I've not named them ; manufacturers are irrelevant as it's an ordering issue.

Is there a FAQ that covers this? 3/4 of the above is reality, but there is also conjecture. Sales Droids have any comments? Does anyone use pre-printed "set" sheets and coloured pens to get salesman in line with buyers?

[DIY]

"Aidan Karley" wrote a long story which has been snipped:

uk.people.consumers?

[nightjar]

Welcome to the real world, where mistakes happen, particularly where people have to enter things on a computer and can forget to click on non-default options. The shop is acting reasonably and sorting things out.

You should try assembling a bed ordered as 4'6" and supplied with 4'6" slats, but 5' top and bottom sections, after you have driven it, in the original packing, all marked 4'6", the length of France, because you didn't want to sleep on the floor waiting for a French supplier to deliver.

Colin Bignell

[A.Clews]

Thus spake Aidan Karley (name1 [e-mail]) unto the assembled multitudes:

You said (in another thread) that you'd "almost lost a grand" because of this.

Why?

Goods are not as ordered. Reject and demand replacement or refund, simple as that, surely?

[Aidan Karley]

The goods delivered were as the order form ; the order form was wrongly filled-out, and since I'd never seen such a thing (the form) before I didn't know what the exact terminology means. To be more precise ... the armchair specification gave a model name and the appropriate colour fabric ("russet"). On the same form the sofa model was given, and the phrase "finish : Windsor", which the salesman told us meant that a particular "weight" of fabric would be used. And by the waggling of the swatches we thought that we'd specified the "russet" colour for this too. But it seems that with these two items of furniture from the same manufacturer, only one uses the term "finish" to mean "fabric weight X and colour dark brown". Which seems totally insane, but that seems to be how this manufacturer works. (I suspect that there's an element of Tweedledum-&-Tweedledee use of English here too, but knowing these languages is what the salesman is for.) Anyway, the shop are biting the bullet on this (which mean they'll sell the mis-coloured sofa as ex-display elsewhere and lose £100 out of their profit margin - watch me cry), and the manufacturers have started making a new sofa in the "russet" colour. Should be here in a few weeks. Saves a deal of stress and feeding the lawyers.