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Original poster

Has anyone ever ordered a sofa and when it was delivered it didn't fit through the door?

18 replies

IlanaK · 01/02/2009 20:55

I am in a bit of a panic. We ordered a sofa from John Lewis in the sales (cost almost £900 though). It is due to be delivered in a week's time (we chose the fabric so they made it to order). When we bought it, the guy did repeatedly ask us if we were sure it would fit through our front door. Now, we have measured and compared and are really worried that actually it won't fit. We live in a large block of flats so there is no way it could come through the window or anything.

So, what happens if they turn up and it doesn't fit? Do they take it away and charge you the full amount anyway (we have already paid). Or, should I call and try to cancel now (but their terms and conditions say we would be liable for 20% anyway and there is still a chance it might fit through te door.)

Anyone been in this situation or are we the only ones stupid enough??

OP posts:

bodiddly · 01/02/2009 20:59

I think that this is actually quite common. How many floors up are you in the block of flats?

Original poster

IlanaK · 01/02/2009 21:00

4, but not at all accessible by window.

OP posts:

bodiddly · 01/02/2009 21:02

aaargh. I would have thought it was worth calling them in the morning to see whether they can help you work out if it will fit through the door. Its not just the door you need to consider though its the staircase up to the flat and round the corners etc that can also be tricky. Dp has a glazing company and is regularly called in to carry sofas up ladders through windows!

Original poster

IlanaK · 01/02/2009 21:06

The stairs are no problem - really wide and good corners (unlike the tiny lifts!). Its the front door I am really worried about.

OP posts:

bodiddly · 01/02/2009 21:07

once it is in your flat are you confident it will go in to the living room ... or is that doorway an issue as well

Original poster

IlanaK · 01/02/2009 21:23

No, once it is in the front door, it will be fine.

OP posts:

Boysboysboys · 01/02/2009 21:26

We ordered a sofa from John Lewis that didn't fit. They took it back and we reordered it to be made up in our house. Bit of a hassle but we got our sofas!

MrsMuddle · 01/02/2009 21:28

We bought one once that fitted through the door, but the door of the room it was to go in was at right angles to the front door and there was no room for manoeuvre.

It was many many years ago, but IIRC we had to pay for it, and then sell it through the small ads. (This was pre-ebay days!)

bodiddly · 01/02/2009 21:28

Is it worth phoning JL transport with the sizes and seeing whether they think it will fit ... they do it day after day so they might have more of an idea?

supersalstrawberry · 01/02/2009 21:29

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Original poster

IlanaK · 01/02/2009 21:29

boysboysboys - did they charge you extra?

I think I will probably have to call them tomorow.

OP posts:

Boysboysboys · 01/02/2009 21:49

No. In fact, DH managed to pursuade them to not charge us the extra for putting it together in our house! We actually had a problem with the sofa once it was in and it was sorted really quickly and well!

zipzap · 03/02/2009 00:40

sometimes you can get sofas made so they are in big sections to be assembled on site, might be worth seeing if they can do this option for you belatedly?

I had this for a sofa ordered from furniture village. it was mega bargain, I wanted it for my bedroom. I was 38 weeks pregnant and got the lady to measure it for me in the shop as they didn't have the brochures for it any more (think it was one of the last of a discontinued style) and bump got in the way doing the measuring. Measurement she came back with was 3 cm shorter than the height of the doorway it needed to go through. Made sure she was sure and happy of this, then when sofa was delivered, it turned out to be 5cm too tall to get through doorway, even after extra bit of wood was pulled off the top bit.

So I rang the store while the delivery people still there, played the very upset and very pregnant card , pointed out that it would have gone in if their measurements had been correct (luckily had written them down on the shop lady's card). The base of the sofa was also ripped - if it had fitted I might have rung up and complained but it was in my interest to have something else wrong with it in order to be able to reject it for two reasons. Luckily delivery people were able to take it away with them then so didn't need it to hang around at home.

Whilst they state very clearly that they don't do refunds if it doesn't fit, fact they had given me the wrong measurement meant I got the refund - but seem to remember having to battle to get the scotch guarding money returned and think we ended up settling on paying half the delivery fee each. baby had turned up early and then lady was away so it was a few weeks before I managed to get it sorted, luckily baby started screaming when I stood my ground and they didn't want to refund for scotch guarding so they gave in very quickly

good luck!

Tinker · 03/02/2009 00:46

Can you take the door off? We had to do that in our last house. It's amazing how they can be manouvered round

kylesmybaby · 03/02/2009 01:04

had this exact thing with dfs recently.

same measurements as sofa already here so thought it would be ok. forgot that i didnt have a light outsde front door when old one came in. oh and new door frame.

the guys were fantastic. tried for ages to get it in. no way though. some sofas can be taken apart. luckily mine went into three pieces.

they scraped it on way in though and are coming to fix this week.

did ask what would happen it it hadnt come apart. they said they would take it back and then let me know which ones i could fit though the door.

they were great. was so stressful at the time though.

let us know what happens. good luck.

nooka · 03/02/2009 05:21

John Lewis are really good on customer service, so are likely to be helpful, and also have decent delivery men. Our sofa came from them and comes in two parts, held together with Velcro and a bolt through the bottom. Which has turned out to be a blessing, as although access wasn't a problem with our first flat we have moved three times since then, and as it was the biggest sofa we could find (dh is 6'5") I don't think it would have made it into any of the other houses!

We had a bookcase delivered in our flat in New York, which we were a bit worried about, but the delivery men managed it no problem at all. When it came to moving however the removal guys insisted that it was totally impossible to take it out, and that the delivery men must have assembled it in situ (like we wouldn't have noticed!). We had to remove the banister from the stairs in the end, which was incredibly annoying as we then had to pay for it to be fixed, and hope that our landlord wasn't incredibly upset. Some people who move furniture are better at it than others!

AliceTheCamelHasGotTheHump · 03/02/2009 05:27

I got a sofa from Freecycle once and it just wouldn't fit. No way, no how. We re-freecycled it .

superloopy · 03/02/2009 05:43

We ordered two sofas which when delivered didn't fit through our front door. Thankfully one of the delivery guys took our front door off and they were then able to squeeze them in.
We have since sold our flat, we sold it fully furnished inc the sofas. But after we bought the sofas we had new windows and doors installed. The new frontdoor frame was quite a lot smaller.
They will have to dismantle the sofas if they ever want to get them out.

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