RugKnots Area Rugs

This was my TERRIBLE! Experience at buying rugs from Rugknots.com. I had really wanted and expected to leave them a 5 star review, based on their mainly positive reviews I read when I decided to buy rugs from them. I believe in giving every business I shop with completely fair & honest reviews, b/c I know how important legitimate reviews are to a Company's business & reputation - I feel it's never right or ethical to write a false or undeserved business review, under any circumstances. Everything written in my review of Rugknots is true & correct (to the best of my knowledge), & accurately describes what happened to me. I apologize my review is SO long, but it's very important to me to let any potential shoppers on Rugknots.com read what happened to me, as a result of my unfortunate decision to buy (3) rugs from them. I originally chose Rugknots.com to buy custom, handknotted persian rugs based on their largely positive reviews and their "glowing" rug descriptions & photos. I was also impressed by Rugknots' Owner's (Ms Naheed Mir) extensive rug knowledge and background, and her charitable work in Pakistan, and donations made from each rug sold on their website. I had always really wanted to have these types of authentic persian rugs, but had found them too expensive, but Rugknots' prices seemed competitive and affordable. I have always wanted to own and have in my home beautiful handmade persian rugs (right now, we have (2) "manufactured" Ethan Allen persian rugs we've had for 15+ years, and though they are still beautiful to look at, and in good condition, they just aren't the same thing as "custom handmade" persian rugs. Our home has mainly hardwood floors on the main level, and I wanted to buy (3) larger beautiful persian rugs to display on our wood floors. I did lots of research before finally selecting Rugknots.com to buy my rugs from, but I hesitated buying rugs online (due to not being able to personally inspect them and see them up close) versus buying rugs in person from a reputable rug business. Ultimately, Rugknots' reviews and their selection and prices won me over - they also gave me an additional 15% off discount for being a first-time rug buyer, which was an unexpected bonus as well. On 9/18/2018, I bought (3) rugs online from their website, Rugknots.com. I later found out all my rugs shipped to me had both been stored and shipped from Arsh's Fine Rugs, Rugknots' rug partner in New Jersey. Rugknots' business is located in Maryland. This is Very relevant, because I later learned NONE of the Rugknots' employees I worked with ever personally saw or inspected ANY of my rugs shipped to me from Arsh's Rugs - only the employees who worked at Arsh's Rugs presumably saw or inspected my rugs before they were shipped out. When I received all my rugs near the end of Sept 2018, my Contractor was with me, as he has been doing renovations on our home for the past year. As soon as we laid out all (3) rugs and were able to properly view each rug up close, we right away saw the very unsatisfactory condition and appearance of each rug. All my rugs were definitely NOT as described or as shown on their website, and NOT what I paid for or Expected. Needless to say, I was shocked and deeply disappointed, and very upset. Right after viewing each rug, I immediately called George, the Rugknots sales employee who had originally sold me my (3) rugs, and told George how unhappy and dissatisfied I was with my rugs. George apologized for my dissatisfaction with the rugs, and asked me to send photos of each of the rugs, so he could discuss them with their "partners". My Contractor later took (11) close-up photos of all my rugs, and I sent George all my rug photos on 10/31/2018. Keep in mind at this time, I knew absolutely NOTHING about Rugknots' partnership with Arsh's Rugs, and didn't know George (and later Lexi, another Rugknots employee I worked with after George left), had never personally seen or inspected ANY of my rugs, since they had been stored and shipped from Arsh's Rugs warehouse. Also, please know it is next-to-impossible to properly see almost ANY stain or defect, even bad stains, (like both my Iranian rugs had), in online photos. Most photos simply are unable to show what you can easily see when you're physically next to a rug, and are able to personally see each detail on the rug up close. All my rugs' online photos on Rugknots website looked "perfect", despite my rugs having significant stains, marks and weave defects, because as I've stated, MOST stains and marks and defects, are pretty much invisible on a business site's online photos. Also, when both my Contractor and I first saw each of my rugs up close, both of my Iranian rugs looked used versus new (All my rugs Rugknots sold me were guaranteed to be new), and both rugs had multiple sections of noticeable color "blotches" and other visible defects. These "blotches" throughout both Iranian rugs were NOT simply surface stains that could be easily removed, but appeared to be defects from the original weaving process. Additionally, on the largest of my (2) Iranian rugs, there were 2 significant dark-colored stains that looked like some type of thick oil had been spilled onto the rug years before, and were now deeply and permanently embedded into the rug's fabric - these dark and ugly "oil" stains were very noticeable once you saw the rug up close, and were impossible to clean or remove. This same largest Iranian rug also had several sections along both its outer edges where the rug's fabric was missing, or had "worn" right through the rug, and also were very noticeable when you saw the rug up close. My third rug was from Pakistan- this rug looked the best of the (3), and looking "new" versus used, as it had NO visible stains or marks, unlike my other (2) rugs from Iran. However, my Pak rug was also flawed and unacceptable, because it had very noticeable and severe weaving defects in the rug's fabric, that looked like deeply set creases or lines or ridges. From a distance, these lines or creases almost looked like a series of "waves" running through it, that ruined the rug's overall appearance. George never did get back to me after I'd emailed him my (11) rug photos, to tell me what he and his "partners" discussed about the damages to my rugs. I was frustrated and concerned at not hearing back from him, and finally emailed him about three weeks later to find out why he'd failed to contact me. I was unsure about where things stood with respect to my rugs. George's delays in getting back to me, along with my "agonizing" over whether to keep my rugs vs returning them, contributed to my keeping my rugs past Rugknots' usual 30-day return period. George was frequently difficult to reach by phone, and most times I could only communicate with him via email. I finally heard back from George when he emailed me back around 10/22/18, and apologized for taking so long to get back to me; he said he'd been away quite a bit recently, because he was helping take care of his mother who was ill. George never did tell me the result of his conversation with his Arsh's Rugs' Partners about the photos I'd emailed him showing all my rugs' damages. In retrospect, I should have quizzed him much more about this, and realized later this was a HUGE RED FLAG that George didn't have any concrete answers or solutions for making things "right" for me. All along, I should have been way more proactive, and demanded to speak to Rugknots' Owner (Ms Naheed Mir), or another person in charge, immediately after finding out Arsh's Rugs shipped me damaged rugs. During the entire just over two months period I had my rugs, NO ONE in Management EVER called me to apologize for me being sent damaged rugs, or acknowledged they were responsible, or tried to make things "right" for me, and confirm I was satisfied with the outcome. My husband has since said I probably should have kept the rugs, as from a distance, all the rugs looked OK - he felt all along Rugknots was likely NOT going to give me all my money back, due to how things had played out so far. Perhaps he was right, and I should have kept the rugs, despite my dissatisfaction with them, but I feel you should never have to settle for less than what the business promised, or settle for less than what you wanted or expected to get. Looking back now, during the approx two month period I worked exclusively with George, I believe he was incapable of helping me more than he did, based on Rugknots' policies. However, I still feel George (and later Lexi) should have been honest and upfront with me, and let me know I was likely NOT getting my full refund back from Rugknots, based on the amount of time I'd had the rugs to this point, (despite not using or damaging them in any way), and based on Rugknots' very problematic wording for the customer in their "FREE" 30-day return policy. Their return policy says in part, "the rugs need to be shipped back within 30 days in the same, unused condition they were shipped in." These (2) words, "SAME" and "UNUSED" words in their return policy were the sticking point for me, and the justification Rugknots later gave for only giving me a partial refund. I took great care during the period we had the rugs in our home, to not have anyone walk on, or "use" any of our (3) rugs at all, so that Rugknots couldn't later claim the rugs were "used", which is against their return policy. My husband and I took extreme care with all our rugs, and put them in other rooms that weren't being occupied. Also, we have no kids living with us anymore, and have no dogs or other pets, and both my husband and I don't wear our shoes in the house, and are very neat and meticulous. I will admit I DID keep all (3) rugs past their 30-day usual return policy. As I've previously stated, George was able to approve extending their usual 30-day return policy, to accommodate my being shipped damaged rugs. I was literally "terrified" at the thought of having to re-package and ship all of my rugs back to them: all (3) of our handmade persian rugs they'd shipped to me were very large, very heavy and bulky, and it takes a very physically strong and able person to be able to properly re-package them. Both my husband and I are small people, and aren't physically strong, plus we are both 65 years old. This is why I was I seriously considered keeping all my rugs, despite how unhappy I was with them, because I honestly didn't know how I was going to be able to ship them back, and I deliberated for a long period between keeping them vs returning them. I will never know to this day IF I had returned all my rugs back within their 30-day time frame, IF Rugknots would have gone ahead and given me back my full refund or not, but I highly doubt it. What is very problematic and conflicting about their return policy, is even though they claim they offer a completely FREE 30-day return policy if you don't love your rugs, they also include the potentially "he said / she said" stipulation that "all rugs need to be returned UNUSED AND in the SAME condition that you received it." In my case, my rugs clearly were "damaged" when they were sent to me, so I was in a real quandary about it. George's delays in getting back to me, along with the hard time I had reaching him, also contributed to me keeping my rugs for over 30 days. In retrospect, I should have insisted on speaking with Rugknots' Owner, Ms Mir, to find out what my best options were, and what I could expect, based on how "problematic" their return policy is worded, when you are the very unlucky recipient of being shipped (3) defective rugs. Other than George's extending their 30-day return period, (which Management was upset about, and reluctantly approved, I found out later) and trying to see if Rugknots would approve paying to have a rug professional come and look at my rugs (which never happened), I realize now I was very naive, and too trusting about getting my money back, once I finally returned the rugs. Also, George should have been more of an advocate for me, and told both Rugknots and Arsh's Rugs he fully believed I'd been sent damaged rugs in error, and insisted they give me a FULL refund if I decided to return my rugs. There were several red flags after I let George know they'd sent me defective rugs, and yet I still believed everything would turn out OK, based on their reviews, and how many years they'd been in business. Unexpectedly, George left me a phone message on 11/26/18, telling me it was his last day with Rugknot, and that Lexi would work with me as his replacement. George's surprise departure totally shook and upset me, as up until he left, he has been he ONLY person there who have ever been in contact with me, and felt responsible for me being shipped damaged rugs. After George left, I felt upset, and on my own, and unsure of what to do next. At this point, I was even considering still keeping my rugs, due to the HUGE challenges of re-packing them, and shipping them back! For the next few days, I worked with Lexi about possibly buying (3) "replacement" rugs, as I would have been happy keeping all my rugs, IF they'd actually matched their website descriptions and photos. I finally decided against both options, due to the high risk of being shipped defective rugs again from their partnered warehouse, and returned all my rugs at the beginning of Dec 2018. Unbelievably, Arsh's Rugs, Rugknots' Partners, in NJ, falsely accused me of "damaging all my rugs with usage and stain damage while I'd had them", and claimed they'd thoroughly inspected them before shipping them to me in "excellent condition". Additionally, Arsh's Rugs stated "all the rugs I'd shipped them were damaged beyond repair", and denied ever shipping me damaged merchandise. Rugknots fully backed and supported Arsh's Rugs, despite all the earlier documented "proof" of emails, phone calls and photos I'd sent and communicated to George proving they had shipped me damaged rugs from the very start; George MUST have shared this info earlier with both Lexi and the Owner, and there way absolutely no way they didn't know about my extreme dissatisfaction and unhappiness with my rugs ever since I first got them. My contractor (who had been present with me when I had first opened and laid out all my rugs), also sent a "corroborating witness" statement confirming Rugknots' Partners shipped me damaged rugs from the very beginning, and were not telling the truth". It was truly one-sided, and totally "their word against mine, and I was in a complete "no-win situation. Rugknots only refunded me about 1/2 the money I'd paid them, and I took at total loss of just over $4000! After learning that Rugknots was only giving me 1/2 my money back, I immediately filed formal complaints to various Consumer Protection Agencies, to try to get the rest of my money back from Rugknots. I'm also looking at other possible (legal) options, as I WILL NEVER BE OK WITH TAKING THIS HUGE MONEY HIT WHEN I DID NOTHING TO DESERVE OR WARRANT IT! Whatever happened to businesses supporting and simply BELIEVING your hard-working and honest paying customers versus your employees, and giving your customers the benefit of the doubt? The main reason WHY excellent and successful businesses like Nordy's and Costco are so popular, and will hopefully never go out of business, is because they're so very good at consistently delivering excellent customer service, and simply BELIEVING their customers! They totally acknowledge and listen to their customers' concerns, and support their customers no matter what, and believe their customers when they tell them they are unhappy or dissatisfied with a product or service. These same excellent businesses make sure their customers end up being happy and satisfied with the final outcome before they leave. In my situation with Rugknots, Rugknots' management did NONE of the things that either Nordy's or Costco or others' that are similar to them, do. Instead, neither Rugknots nor their partners, Arsh's Rugs, ever acknowledged or believed Arsh's ever sent me damaged goods in error, never called me to discuss how they could make things "right" for me, and finally, never worked on making sure I was OK and satisfied with the final outcome, which obviously I definitely was NOT! I've had lots of time to think about this in the past just over 6 months since this happened to me. I believe that what happened on the day my (3) rugs got packaged and shipped from Arsh's Rugs warehouse, is the Owner or someone else in charge, HAS to have known who was responsible for packaging and shipping me (3) damaged rugs in error. When I researched Arsh's Rugs, I found out they're a very small family-owned business, with under (5) employees (these "employees" may all be family members, I'm not sure). Arsh's Rugs gets very high/positive reviews, so what happened to me was likely an unfortunate and unintentional quality control error and oversight; however, since I WAS shipped (3) damaged rugs, then all my rugs, for whatever reason, were clearly NOT properly inspected ( or never inspected) before they were packaged and shipped out. Businesses are NOT run by robots - they're run by humans, and human make mistakes ALL the time! I can't come up with any other logical conclusion as to how else I was shipped not, 1, not 2, but 3 damaged rugs! Each rug is individually packaged, so whomever was in charge that day of quality control for my rugs, made very human errors, failed on all counts, and blamed me, the paying customer, instead! The only other conclusion I can fathom is that perhaps they had a temp or new employee working that day in their warehouse, who didn't for whatever reason, follow the proper pre-inspection procedures, and was possibly scared to come forward and tell anyone what had happened, for fear of losing their job, or getting into trouble. I will NEVER know what really happened that day at Arsh's Rugs when they shipped me my rugs - the fact remains that neither Rugknots nor Arsh's Rugs ever took responsibility for shipping me defective rugs, and falsely blamed me for causing all my rugs' damages! Also, Arsh's Rugs' Owners never changed their "story" about thoroughly inspecting all my rugs before shipping them to me in "excellent condition". I would have been OK with getting damaged rugs, IF Rugknots' Management had simply called me immediately to apologize and offer to make things "right", after I had let George know on 10. 01. 18 I'd been sent damaged rugs by mistake. As I wrote earlier in my review, NO ONE from management, including the Owner, EVER called me to apologize for my being shipped defective merchandise, or ever acknowledged I had in fact, been shipped damaged merchandise from the beginning. Or ever took any responsibility for it. George was the only employee at Rugknots who seemed to feel at all responsible for my dilemma, and believed I had, in fact, been sent damaged rugs. When I later worked with Lexi, George's replacement, after George had left at the end of Nov 2018, Lexi KNEW from George I'd been sent damaged rugs, and was unhappy and not sure what my best options were. However, Lexi never apologized or acknowledged they were in anyway responsible. The main impression I got during the short time I worked with her, when I very briefly considered buying (3) "replacement" rugs from them, was that she never believed me, based on their overall track record, and the # of happy customers who had been successfully sent nice rugs - I felt she was frustrated with me, and just wanted me to return my rugs, and go away. Lexi also said this had never happened before, and she felt she'd done everything she could to satisfy me. As I've stated, I believe that more often than not, both Rugknots and Arsh's Rugs' customers ARE shipped beautiful and undamaged rugs, but that doesn't change the fact I was NOT! Also, since this happened to me, it very likely HAS happened to others'' (who, unlike me, never complained, and kept their rugs), and it likely WILL happen again. Despite what happened, I still very much want to have authentic persian rugs in my home. After my terrible Rugknots' experience, I will NEVER EVER buy any types of rugs online again, but will only go in person to a reputable rug dealer, where I can properly see and inspect a rug before committing to buying it. The risks to me are clearly not worth any possible savings I might get shopping online. Had I been able to see my (3) rugs in person versus only online, I never would have been in this awful position, or ended up buying ANY of my rugs! I have spent HOURS working on this, and my health has been severely compromised by all the stress and upset this has caused me and my family. I am highly educated, and know what my legal rights are. What happened to me is simply unacceptable, and NOT "right", and I am still in shock and denial that things panned out for me the way they did. My main objective is to get my money back and move on with my life. At some point, no amount of money is worth it, but I am as angry and as upset today, as I was just over 6 months ago, when I first made the truly unfortunate decision to buy my rugs from Rugknots.com. I definitely did NOT deserve to be falsely and blatantly accused of doing something I did NOT do, and having my hard-earned money wrongfully withheld from me. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine this would happen to me! I was SO looking forward to simply buying and having (3) beautiful persian rugs displayed in our home. However, instead of being able to enjoy having the rugs here in our home, for the past several months, I've had NO rugs, have $4000 less dollars to buy new ones, and am still attempting to get the rest of my money back from Rugknots.