Gerald returned a mattress last week. He had slept on it for thirty-nine nights.
He told me over the fence twice, in the manner of a man who has beaten a system. A van came. The mattress went. The money was back in his account by Friday. Thirty-nine nights of Gerald, and they took it anyway.
I looked it up afterwards, because I am that person now. He was entitled. Forty nights is standard and some of them stretch to a hundred — you may sleep on it, sweat into it, have opinions about it at three in the morning, and then send it back for the whole amount.
Then I opened the drawer beside my bed and did the sums on that.
Sealed for hygiene. Once opened, yours. That is the phrase, more or less, and it's perfectly legal — there's a regulation, it has a number, and the reasoning isn't mad. But look at the shape of it. Nine hundred pounds of mattress: forty nights and a van. Fifty-two pounds of something bought at eleven at night by a woman who has told nobody: no nights, no van, no number you'd want to ring.
The expensive mistake is protected. The small brave one isn't.
Margaret returned a bath mat in 2004 and still refers to it as an event. She would not return this. She'd put it in the drawer, be quietly disappointed for a year, and mention it to no one — which is exactly what the rule is counting on.
Tilda has taken up residence on Gerald's replacement. He hasn't noticed. Day nine.
You can send back the bed. You cannot send back the reason you couldn't sleep in it.
huxi does sixty days. Not forty. Used, opened, unimpressed — sixty days, cash back to the card you paid with, five working days, no persuading required. It's written down, which is the part I care about. Sucking Sweet is £52 and is where most people start; if it isn't the one, you have two months to say so and be believed.
The rule itself is here, with the regulation numbers, if you'd like to know exactly what you are and aren't owed everywhere else: [Read the mattress rule →]
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