1 Commercial Flooring Report April 2019

If you will bear with me for a moment, I’m going to toot my own horn. I have been in the floor covering industry for over 48 years. I started in retail sales and management in March of 1971, owned a carpet cleaning and repair business, for both residential and commercial, and started working on carpet and vinyl flooring complaints in the mid 70’s. I made a commitment to immerse myself in every-thing flooring, making continuous trips to Dalton, Georgia until I moved to the area 20 years ago. The flooring in-dustry taught me about flooring. Dalton, Georgia, the car-pet capital of the world, now the flooring capital of the world, is where you have to be if you want to stay con-nected with what’s going on in flooring. Here are a few of my accomplishments past and present. I called on carpet mills and created a carpet and flooring inspection business, the first of its kind, working then exclusively for manufacturers. We trained and certified independent inspectors and the claims man-agers and departments of virtually every carpet mill in existence for many years. I was, and still am, a pest in the industry as I have an insatiable appetite to learn. I make it a point to know everything and everyone I can to know about anything that has to do with flooring, from concrete to carpet. At this point I have associated with LGM some of the best and brightest minds in existence in all categories of flooring and we have no equal or rivals. We are in the business of determining, solving, resolving and preventing flooring failures. As a unique and one of a kind business, we have become known as the go to guys in the industry. To read more click on this link to our website and my CV. https://lgmandassociates.com/lewis-g-migliore-president/ Our firm has a client list of the who’s who across the country and the world which includes businesses, corporations, institutions, design, architectural and general contracting firms, insurance companies and attorneys. If you have a problem of any kind with commercial flooring, we’re who you want to call. Here is the reason for this somewhat personal rant. We have a client that has an LVP flooring that was installed in new condos and the flooring is cupping and curling. The manufacturer sent an inspector who said the condition was installation because the flooring material was installed “too tight.” After our on site physical inspection and testing the flooring per ISO 23999 Resilient Floor Covering – Determination of Dimensional Stability and Curling after Expo-sure to Heat, the product was determined to have an inherent planar instability. That is, it would not lay flat and it didn’t out of the box. This is a manufacturing defect. In addition, samples taken from attic

2 Commercial Flooring Report April 2019

stock material, still in boxes, revealed different backing color and mark-ing, different drape of the material and an “out of the box” doming in the vinyl planks in all three colors used on the installation. This was not an installation related issue but clearly and irrefutably a product defect. If the floor was fit too tight the material would peak where it pinched to-gether. In this case, as you’ll see in the photos, every plank was curling or doming individually. When our client presented the findings to the manufacturer’s claims department, they were told the report was de-clined because I was not on their list of inspectors.

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Every plank in every condo was cupping. This is not an installation issue but strictly

manufacturing.

Note how each col-

or plank drapes

differently. This

indicates a different

make up in the vinyl

with the one that

drapes most being

more soft and plia-

ble.

Note the variation in

the backing color

and shade of each

plank, indicating a

variation in the vinyl

make up itself and

an inconsistency.

3 Commercial Flooring Report April 2019

Mind you, my not being on the list does not change the fact that the product is defective. I was livid upon hear-ing this. But after calming down a bit, understood that the first line of defense in a claim is for the manufactur-er to deny it. Only when you make enough noise will you start to unpeel the “onion skin” surrounding the claim denial.

I understand that this is just the process that the claims analyst is instructed to go through when a claim cross-es their desk. The analyst didn’t even look to see if the information was valid. They were supplied with test re-sults from a certified lab that they themselves use, and photos of the defective product which proved without a doubt their product was defective. The manufacturer trains the analyst to find any reason to decline the claim.

This is how the mills are handling claims. No one has an advantage here. It doesn’t matter the volume of business you do with the manufacturer. The saying, “the customer is always right” no longer exists. Com-mercial flooring claims can easily reach six figures and many of the situations we are involved in reach into the millions of dollars. What we do is not for the faint of heart nor the individual with no experience who may be on “the list.” The claims process has also been de-personalized by filing on-line.

You no longer have that one on one customer service experience. We find that most claims are initially de-clined for one reason or another. The analyst may or

LGM and ASSOCIATES

BEFORE YOU START YOUR NEXT PROJECT

CONTACT US FOR GUIDANCE ON SELECTING THE APPROPRIATE FLOORING MATERIAL AND SUBSTRATE SPECIFICATIONS SO WE

CAN HELP KEEP YOU OUT OF TROUBLE.

Note that each plank is cupping individually. Installation and

installers cannot cause this physical change.

4 Commercial Flooring Report April 2019

may not know anything about the product you’re hav-ing a problem with. This is certainly the case with lux-ury vinyl plank and tile. Most of the people selling this product know virtually nothing about it. And it doesn’t always help to move up the food chain to get results from the mill. Having said this, it’s still best if you follow the manu-facturer’s guidelines or the process will take longer. As soon as you know you have a problem you must immediately file the claim on line or by phone. This is the manufacturers first date of reference. Wait 24 hours and call the claims department or your sales representative to verify they received your claim. Al-ways begin by putting the person there – pictures, samples, documents and information. Unfortunately, you must get through the weeds before you get to the water – be tenacious. It is still true, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease.” Be persistent, persuasive and personable but firm. And make sure you have infor-mation on every aspect of what the product is doing on the floor. Your phone is invaluable in documenting the history of the complaint in pictures as are all the emails you have a trail of. If you run into a problem on the jobsite you should im-mediately contact the mill rep and document every-thing. You can always use your phone to keep notes and take pictures or video. Realizing that the mill can’t do anything “right now” and sometimes you don’t have a choice, you have to begin the installation. You must get the sales representative involved and file your concern on the manufacturer’s on line claims. You may think you don’t want to file a claim yet but the on-ly way to protect your decision to install is to file the claim, the date matters. If possible, get someone on the phone and if the analyst can’t give you advise climb the food chain and speak with a supervisor. Most manufacturers will say to inspect the product be-fore installation. This is fairly easy with broadloom carpet. But today, with modular carpet and modular hard surface flooring, no one is going to open every box to check the material. You can however take a sampling of material randomly and inspect it or do a small mock up of the product. In reality, the installa-tion contractor should not be doing the inspection. The manufacturer should do that before the product ships to insure there are no visible or hidden/latent defects in the material. The carpet industry had an “Areas of Responsibility” years ago that stated what everyone should do prior to installation. I helped write some of that and we still have it but you won’t find it anywhere today because no one wants you to know about it.

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Of course, it’s best not to find yourself needing to file a claim at all. Here are a few tips on how to avoid complaints;

• Know what can go wrong based on the job and what you have to work with and your experience. Part of this is knowing if the installation site is acceptable for installing the flooring.

• If need be, on certain jobs, you can ask for a field tech representative to be on site for the job start up to insure nothing goes wrong. It still may but you have some assurance by having manufacturer rep-resentation.

Here are the most common causes of claims which, the sales rep, designer, architect, GC or you may have created:

-Overselling -Environmental conditions - Leed -Mis-specification -Not knowing what’s wrong and how to fix it -Lack of product knowledge -Ignorance and lack of common sense -Lack of installation skill and knowledge -Chance shipments by the manufacture -Acceptance of conditions and substrate -Customer’s expectations

Lastly, if necessary, you must defend yourself. Everyone is afraid of attorney’s it seems, and the mere mention of the word attorney elicits reactions that can be compared to having teeth pulled. First, despite what you may think, the law is the same for everyone and it’s about being reasonable especially when it comes to disputes over flooring. Nothing is cut and dry. There are portions of a complaint that are im-pacted by the law governing product performance and those influenced by the normal standards and practices of the industry. You should never respond to a complaint brought against you by a customer, supplier, etc. that is represented by legal counsel without being legally represented yourself. Regardless of what a claims analyst may tell you or the fact they deny the claim, when there are legitimate, provable and irrefutable defects in the material there are legal ramifications. Not being on “the list” does not fly as an excuse for not honoring a legitimate claim where the product is in fact defective.

You may have to ultimately hire a construction attorney to help you win your case. We have involved with us one of the best in the country that can help you. We are also retained by several attorneys in cases around the country at all times. We are, by the way, on the top of that list. Hiring a top notch con-struction attorney can relieve a lot of stress because the attorney will be managing and litigating your case as the expert you aren’t and they’ll get a resolution.

Millions of dollars are lost every year because the industry does not properly respond to claims. This in-cludes manufacturers, dealers, installers, and anyone who has anything to do with trying to resolve a complaint. Certainly claims and complaints are the most distasteful part of being in the flooring busi-ness. No one wants to have to deal with a complaint and most people don’t really know how. You may think you do, but most of you don’t.

In every single case, quick response and a genuine offer to settle the problem, whatever it takes, will end the complaint. This will almost always be a whole lot less than what it takes later, after the end user has been snubbed, jerked around, lied to, made to wait and generally left twisting in the wind. What’s most disturbing is knowing that the situation could have been rectified and resolved sooner, easier and with much less expense if somebody hadn’t dragged their feet and declined, declined, declined over the least little nothings hoping you will just go away. That’s when you need to put us on your list. We’ll tell you if you have a legitimate claim or if you don’t and if you do. It has been said that LGM is not the guys you want sitting on the other side of the table. And us not being on the manufacturers list is a good thing for you.