DougAndJudy
Well-known member
We opted for the theater seats in our 2013 Landmark Mesa. Within a month of using them, a tear appeared at the bottom of the left armrest and at the lower outside corner of the left footrest. The footrest frame was contacting the armrest frame and wearing the fabric. We sent photos to Eric at Heartland Customer Service and he forwarded them to Flair. Flair's representative, Elaine's, response was that we had neglected the problem by failing to notify our dealer, so it was not their problem, and that we were trying to pull a fast one on Flair. At this point we had our new rig less than 3 months.
We had Heartland's Jim Fenner look at the chair while we were at the Gillette Rally. His reaction was that this was definitely a warranty issue. The recliner mechanism was mis-aligned or bent, and this was causing the footrest to rub against the armrest and the recliner mechanism was rubbing against the armrest fabric when the chair was opened or closed. He reported this back to Eric. I talked to Eric and was told that Flair agreed to replace the seats. We were given a tracking number several weeks later. When we saw that the shipping weight was only 21 pounds, I called Eric again to ask what was shipped. He said that Flair had decided that all we needed was an armrest, a foot rest and the recliner mechanism, and that we coud rebuild the chair ourselves, and that it wasn't really Heartland's problem.
It was a month or so later that we arrived at our son's house where the replacement parts were delivered. Upon opening the box, all we got was an armrest and a footrest. So from June until the end of August we went from a replacement theater seats, to an armrest and a footrest that we had to install ourselves into a chair that we paid a premium to get.
I turned the chair over and removed the armrest and replaced it with the new armrest. The recliner mechanism still let the footrest collide with the armrest. I replaced the footrest, shifting it slightly away from the armrest side, and the footrest still rammed the armrest. I could see that the armrest was tilted heavily into the footrest opening, so I tore the chair apart again. I saw that the cushion frame that the armrest attached to was not built square and plumb. I had to remove a bunch of staples and rebuild the cushion frame. This was better but not enough to keep the recliner mechanism from contacting the armrest fabric, so I shimmed the armrest a bit when I mounted it to the cushion frame. Almost there. I finally ended up shifting the recliner mechanism mounts along the cushion frame until the footrest and the recliner mechanism cleared the armrest fabric. The chair seems to operate very well now, no thanks to Flair. All in all I had the chair apart and back together 5 times.
I saw that there are 3 components to the theater seats: right and left recliners and a center console. They are joined together at the base by a 1" square tube that each component bolts to. My question is: how hard would it have been for Flair to ship a complete, properly fuctioning left recliner unit that only required bolting to the square tubing?
The aggravating part is that Heartland Customer Service would not represent our best interests with Flair when negotiating this warranty issue. It's Heartland who decided to source their furniture to Flair. And Heartland who gladly took payment for the contents of our trailer. They seemed to think it was perfectly OK for a paying customer to have to rebuild their own defective furniture.
Since we have had quality problems with Flair furniture on both of the Heartland Landmarks that we have owned, I would be inclined to not recommend Heartland products as long as they continue to accept Flair's poorly built products for their trailers and then not accept responsibility for the furniture items they sell to their customers.
We had Heartland's Jim Fenner look at the chair while we were at the Gillette Rally. His reaction was that this was definitely a warranty issue. The recliner mechanism was mis-aligned or bent, and this was causing the footrest to rub against the armrest and the recliner mechanism was rubbing against the armrest fabric when the chair was opened or closed. He reported this back to Eric. I talked to Eric and was told that Flair agreed to replace the seats. We were given a tracking number several weeks later. When we saw that the shipping weight was only 21 pounds, I called Eric again to ask what was shipped. He said that Flair had decided that all we needed was an armrest, a foot rest and the recliner mechanism, and that we coud rebuild the chair ourselves, and that it wasn't really Heartland's problem.
It was a month or so later that we arrived at our son's house where the replacement parts were delivered. Upon opening the box, all we got was an armrest and a footrest. So from June until the end of August we went from a replacement theater seats, to an armrest and a footrest that we had to install ourselves into a chair that we paid a premium to get.
I turned the chair over and removed the armrest and replaced it with the new armrest. The recliner mechanism still let the footrest collide with the armrest. I replaced the footrest, shifting it slightly away from the armrest side, and the footrest still rammed the armrest. I could see that the armrest was tilted heavily into the footrest opening, so I tore the chair apart again. I saw that the cushion frame that the armrest attached to was not built square and plumb. I had to remove a bunch of staples and rebuild the cushion frame. This was better but not enough to keep the recliner mechanism from contacting the armrest fabric, so I shimmed the armrest a bit when I mounted it to the cushion frame. Almost there. I finally ended up shifting the recliner mechanism mounts along the cushion frame until the footrest and the recliner mechanism cleared the armrest fabric. The chair seems to operate very well now, no thanks to Flair. All in all I had the chair apart and back together 5 times.
I saw that there are 3 components to the theater seats: right and left recliners and a center console. They are joined together at the base by a 1" square tube that each component bolts to. My question is: how hard would it have been for Flair to ship a complete, properly fuctioning left recliner unit that only required bolting to the square tubing?
The aggravating part is that Heartland Customer Service would not represent our best interests with Flair when negotiating this warranty issue. It's Heartland who decided to source their furniture to Flair. And Heartland who gladly took payment for the contents of our trailer. They seemed to think it was perfectly OK for a paying customer to have to rebuild their own defective furniture.
Since we have had quality problems with Flair furniture on both of the Heartland Landmarks that we have owned, I would be inclined to not recommend Heartland products as long as they continue to accept Flair's poorly built products for their trailers and then not accept responsibility for the furniture items they sell to their customers.
