Hi fdb,
If you ask a direct question about a return or exchange policy and a vendor refuses to give you an answer I would be very hesitant about dealing with them.
If for some reason you decided to deal with them anyway then I would assume that they didn’t have one and that your purchase would be final regardless of whether it worked out well for you or not.
Nobody else can feel what you feel on a mattress and it’s as much an art as a science in deciding which mattress is best for you. While it’s certainly true that some online vendors have a great deal of knowledge and experience and if you give them good information on a phone call about yourself, your history with mattresses, your needs and preferences, and your testing experiences, they can provide some very good guidance … but it’s also true that they can only go by “averages” and each person can be unique. What works well for one may not work well for someone else.
If you are confident enough that a particular mattress will be a good match for you in terms of PPP then an online purchase that doesn’t have a return or exchange policy can be a good choice but for those who aren’t certain then the options you have after a purchase to either make exchanges or return a mattress may become a much more important part of your personal value equation. At the very least I would make sure that you know exactly what their return policy is, any costs involved, and that you are comfortable with it so you can factor it into the “risk” and the “value” of a purchase.
Phoenix