I just wanted to take a few minutes to share how bad of an experience I’ve had with, and am currently having with, Select Foam.
They have a 90 day return policy (which starts when you order, not when you receive the mattress), which is short, but better than nothing. However, it took us almost a month to receive our mattress (Select Foam Cirrus Luxe). We ordered on September 2nd and the mattress arrived on September 26th.
They compare it to the Temperpedic Cloud Luxe (hence the nearly identical name). Well they are really nothing alike, other than both using some form of memory foam. Select foam’s mattress is hard and barely acts like memory foam at all, more like a block of normal foam. We gave it about a month, but figured since it took a month to get it and you have to have it back to select foam by 90 days, then we should probably start the return process right away. So on October 22nd we asked to return. It took them until November 7th to get a pickup scheduled and the paperwork sent. As for refunding our money, it took them until December 4th, once again almost a month and required us getting AMEX involved.
On November 22nd I received a bill from Fedex because Select foam didn’t check the correct box on the form to accept the shipping charges. By this point I’ve started talking to both Dwight Miller and Chris Nelson and between the two of them I’ve probably had close to 30 phone calls and an equal number of emails so far. Needless to say this process is getting ridiculous. Well I was told by Chris that they would accept the Fedex shipping charges but apparently that never happened. It is now January 8th and Fedex still wants me to pay the $1027 for shipping.
TLDR; unless you are absolutely certain you want whatever bed you are buying from them, and know you like it, buy somewhere else. It’s a cheap bed for a cheap price. Go to costco or something and get something equivalent with a far far superior return policy.
I’m sorry to hear about your experiences with Select Foam and there is certainly no justification for the lack of timely customer service and followup you have experienced with them. Unfortunately you are not the only one who has had issues with their customer service and delays with returns or refunds (see post #4 here and the posts it links to).
I left a message with Matt (one of the owners) to make him aware of your post and the issues you are having while it certainly shouldn’t be necessary for a third party to become involved … I get somewhat frustrated when I hear about these types of experiences and I’ll also call them tomorrow to see if I can help expedite things so that your issues are resolved as soon as possible
While I can certainly understand your frustration … this part of your post isn’t accurate at all because as unfortunate as your experience may be it doesn’t change the fact that they use very high quality materials in all their mattresses and they are certainly a high quality/value mattress. It’s also unfortunate that you didn’t take advantage of some of the options you had available including asking for an extension to the trial period so you would have had more time for your mattress to break in (7 lb memory foam can take longer than lower quality/density materials to break in) and many customers have also found that removing the wool fire barrier while the mattress is breaking in can make a significant difference in how it feels as well. There are also some suggestions in post #2 here that may have been helpful as well.
Regardless of any options you may have had though … this is now a moot point (although I wanted to include it for the sake of accuracy and for the benefit of others that may read this post) and for now the most important issue is making sure that your fedex billing issue is resolved as quickly as possible.
Thanks for taking the time to share your experience and hopefully this will be resolved very quickly.
Phoenix
NOTE ADDED: Because of ongoing customer service issues and delays Select Foam’s membership has been terminated and I would read the warning here before considering them.
If we had an option to extend our trial I would have taken it for sure, but we had to cover ourselves financially. No one ever offered to extend our trial. It really is quite unfortunate that such bad customer service can ruin this. We still don’t have a bed and are really turned off on purchasing another bed online at all.
As for the bed, I agree the inch or so of 7 lb foam was wonderful, very good memory and cool to the touch. I wish there were like 6 inches of it. Unfortunately, the large top gel layer is barely memory foam, more like very soft standard foam (also cool to the touch).
I was actually all set to buy the Grandis instead, since it has more of the higher density foam, but then I was told return shipping is not covered under their trial policy for the Grandis bed and that if you don’t like it, you’d have to pay for both the return shipping and the initial shipping (reducing the refund).
Do you have any suggestions for another manufacturer that would not have such terrible customer service? Our current thought is to try the Sleep Science Escape since it has the most higher density foam among foam mattresses available at costco (amazing return policy).
I’m not sure if you talked with them on the phone when you were first considering returning the mattress or if your communications were only by email but if you talked with them on the phone they would normally make some good suggestions that may have been helpful including things like giving it more time (and extending the trial period), removing the wool fire barrier, or possibly suggesting a topper at a reduced cost or other suggestions that they may have identified as a result of a conversation.
This is the type of “feel” issue that can change by either removing the wool fire barrier or with some of the other suggestions in the post I linked (including spending more time on the mattress so the material can break in more effectively).
As I mentioned though … this is all a moot point since you have gone past the point where any of this would help your current circumstances.
There is a list of the better online memory foam sources that I’m aware of in post #12 here and outside of Select Foam … none of them have any pattern of customer service issues. I would also make sure you are clear about the return/exchange policies they have and any costs involved because there are many differences between them.
You can see my comments about Sleep Science and the Escape in post #2 here and post #2 here and the posts they link to and you can also see my thoughts about buying from Costco in post #4 here.
If you let me know your city or zip code I’d also be happy to let you know about any of the better local options or possibilities I’m aware of as well.
Phoenix
NOTE ADDED: Because of ongoing customer service issues and delays Select Foam’s membership has been terminated and I would read the warning here before considering them.
We’re very sorry you had a bad experience with our company, that is our fault and we take responsibility. In regards to the Fedex misbilling, we have followed up with our Fedex representative and forwarded you the letter of authorization stating it should be billed to our freight number per your request. You are at no imminent risk of having to pay any sum there. Many individuals love the feel of our Cirrus Luxe, but we’re sorry to hear it was not for you. We wish you the best in solving your sleep needs elsewhere and thank you for your input on themattressunderground as it is a great source of information.
I got a phone call from Fedex today. The charge is still in my name and has not been resolved. The “Letter of Authorization” you forwarded to me is one sentence to someone named Elora asking them to fix my problem. Are they a select foam employee or someone at Fedex? In either case, Fedex has called you numerous times without getting a response.
Apologies are great and all, but action is what counts. As of today you have not taken action.
Pheonix,
You say select foam uses good materials. That may be true. You are quite knowledgeable about all things mattress related. How can you back a company that acts like this though?
Elora is a FedEx employee. We followed FedEx’s protocol for switching the Pro# to our account and paid for it yesterday with a Paul Acosta (also a FedEx employee). We never received any calls and dealt only via email. I’m not sure why you received a call as this issue has been resolved, but should you run into any problems early next week please either contact us or post on this forum to let us know and we will investigate the matter further.
I’m glad to see that your issue has been resolved and sometimes the left hand at FedEX doesn’t know what the right hand is doing … although of course your issues still took longer to resolve than they should have.
[quote]Pheonix,
You say select foam uses good materials. That may be true. You are quite knowledgeable about all things mattress related. How can you back a company that acts like this though? [/quote]
They are a member of this site because they have some great quality/value mattresses and there aren’t nearly enough good quality/value mattress choices in the industry relative to the majority of larger manufacturers that dominate the industry.
The large majority of their customers are happy with their purchase and these types of issues only affect a small percentage of their customers. While I don’t believe there is any risk of loss and to my knowledge all the legitimate issues that their customers have had have all been resolved in the end … I agree with you that they need to improve their customer service for the minority that have issues such as yours after a purchase which is why I added this link as a caution to their description in the two online lists here and here in the mattress shopping tutorial which include them which the members here would be referring to so that any potential customers can take the potential of these types of issues and any additional risk into account when they make their purchase decision. NOTE ADDED: Because of ongoing customer service issues and delays Select Foam’s membership has been terminated and I would read the warning here before considering them.