Avoiding Upholstery Cleaning Problems

A call that I received just yesterday reminded me of how simple it is to avoid costly upholstery cleaning claims, and yet easily we can get into trouble by being careless.

The owner of a cleaning company called to ask how to remove browning from a white cotton sofa that his men cleaned incorrectly. It was his contention that the problem was caused because his technician used a carpet cleaning detergent instead of a more appropriate upholstery cleaning rinse agent.

I contend that what happened was a result of a deeper problem:

The cleaning technician failed to test the fabric.

Readers may object that testing fibers is a difficult and time consuming process with results that are challenging to interpret. Nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is that a simple burn test that determines whether or not a textile is made of absorbent, easily damaged natural fibers, or easy to clean synthetic fibers that have low absorbency only takes a few moments, and can easily be interpreted by any cleaning technician.

Such a test only asks the technician to observe if the test sample melts (synthetic) or burns and crumbles (natural or blend of natural and synthetic).

If the technician had that information, which he could have gained in just a minute or so, he would have rightly decided to use a neutral detergent, an acidic rinsing agent, a low wetting tool, and fans to speed dry the fabric (all which were present on the truck.)

The tools and products available to safely clean delicate natural fiber furniture are surprisingly effective and not much more costly than carpet cleaning products. There is no reason not to test to determine which ones are the safest to use on any given fabric.

One last thought: Although browning is usually correctable, this cleaning company will likely pay an expensive claim for this problem, as the customer has become impatient with the repeated visits needed to completely correct a problem that should never have occured in the first place.