Back on October 2005 my wife and I came to Florida to do a final walkthrough on our newly built home. At that time I was employed with a CPA firm in New York City and my wife had a year left in finishing her degree in Education. We finally moved to Florida in January 2007 as soon as my wife received her degree. While we were in Florida during October 2005 we decided to shop around for furniture. Our bad luck brought us to this gigantic showroom called Ashley Furniture. We decided to go ahead and buy furniture even though we wouldn't be living in our new home for about another year. To make a long story short we bought a sectional leather sofa (the name of the sofa is the Sonoma-Taupe) along with the Alpine bedroom set. The furniture was delivered within the week that we were on vacation doing the final walkthrough for our new home. My wife and I checked the furniture very carefully and numerous times before we signed off on the delivery sheet.

In January of 2007 we finally moved to Port St. Lucie, Florida from New York City. Basically everything was in place for us within our home. Within the first seven months of using the sectional, the leather began to peel off and also the springs on the middle piece of the sectional began to protrude out the back of the sectional to the point it looks like it will rip through the leather. I was furious. I couldn't believe what was happening to our leather sofa after having spent almost $2, 500.00 on it and only using it for such a short period of time.

My wife and I decided to go back to Ashley Furniture where we purchased the furniture and see if we can get our money back or perhaps a new leather sofa. To make a long story short no one was able to help us. They told me that the warranty was only for a year and that it has expired. I told them that this is a manufacturer’s defect and that leather should never peel and the springs should never stick out from the back of the sofa especially since none of us sit on the middle part of the sectional. We left the store so angry. After going to the store several times I was told that nothing can be done. The peeling on the leather is now about the size of a basketball in several spots. I finally had enough with this sofa since it is clearly a manufacturer’s defect and decided to go back to the Ashley Homestore in Stuart. Yesterday 08/20/08, I said screw this and went back to the store right after work. I took several pictures with my digital camera showing all the manufacturing defects. I spoke to a manager at the Ashley Homestore in Stuart in which she agreed was clearly a manufacturer’s defect and was advised to call customer service.

After leaving the store I went home and immediately called customer service and was told that even though my sofa has a warranty for 1 year the leather part of the sofa is covered for three years. This was news to me since no one ever told me that the leather was covered for three years against manufacturer’s defects even though I spoke to several managers at the Ashley Store. They said that a repair technician will call me within 48 hours and setup a date so they can come and look at my sofa. I told them that this sofa is beyond repair and that I am not looking to have it fixed. It is clearly a manufacturer’s defect on the leather and that I either get a full refund or a store credit for the entire amount. I was advised that the first step is that someone needs to come out and look at the sofa before anything can be done.

Now to the part of my bedroom set. I ordered my bedroom set in October 2005 and was delivered within a week to my home. I asked the delivery people to place the bedroom set exactly where my wife wanted it placed so we wouldn't have to move it again. The bedroom set wasn't used until we moved in January of 2007 to Florida from New York City. So for the first year until we moved it sat where it was placed by the Ashley delivery people. In January 2007 once we moved to Florida we had DIRECTV come and install the cable in our bedroom. My wife and I had to move her dresser so the DIRECTV person can hookup the cable since the cable outlet was located behind her dresser. We picked up her dresser to move it about a foot or two out of the way. As soon as we put it down her dresser almost fell over. We looked and to our disbelief we noticed that the leg of the dresser was broken off. Immediately we gently put the dresser on its back side to see what was going on and we noticed that the leg was not properly attached on the dresser because it had been broken off. Basically the delivery people knew that the wood part where the leg and dresser connect was broken so they took it upon themselves not to tell us and just put the leg under without it being secured on the dresser. I have a three year old in the house and god forbid she leaned up on the dresser and it fell on her. I called my father-in-law who is really handy and he came over and fixed my wife's dresser within an hour.

I then told my wife and father in law to check the rest of the bedroom furniture including my chest drawer and the two nightstands. We picked up the chest drawer and everything was fine. We picked up one of the nightstands and it was fine. We then picked up the other nightstand and guess what; the leg on the nightstand was also broken. At this point I was furious and couldn’t believe someone would be so grossly negligent in the safety of others. My father in law decided to fix that as well since calling Ashley would do me no good.

Is this the way you treat your customers. You should be ashamed of yourself. I will never ever in my entire life buy another piece of furniture from Ashley, neither will I recommend any of my friends and families from buying furniture form you. I will wait and see what the outcome will be with my leather sofa since the leather is covered for three years which would now expire in two more months on 10/2008.

If I do not reach a resolution with Ashley Furniture I will file a report with the Better Business Bureau, the Florida Division of Consumer Services, the Florida Office of Attorney General, the local news in my area and also will take Ashley Furniture to small claims court. Ashley you have left me NO CHOICE. I tried to do things the nice way but I will not be taken advantage by your deceiving customer practices, lousy customer service, incompetent sales and delivery people, your cheap furniture that you do not stand behind whatsoever and your total disregard to the safety of your customers.

Thanks for nothing,

Jimmy (former customer)