What would you do?

I’m reno-ing a condo for rent and a couple weeks ago I bought a ceramic sink top from a big box store. I inspected it very carefully when I received it and it was good. I hired a plumber to install it and checked his work after he left and it looked great. No one has been in the unit this week. I went in today to take photos and the sink is cracked in half.

I am a landlord, contractor and licensed plumber. I had a similar issue. A client, who is an attorney, had purchased a vanity with a ceramic sink top (combo) to be installed in his second bathroom. I noticed the sink top wasn't level. I was hired to do the finished plumbing installation through out the property. I declined to install the vanity sink and asked them to exchange it. One of their carpenters went ahead and installed the vanity cabinet. When I returned to the house, they got their handyman to install the ceramic sink top with drain and faucet all hooked up. Because the sink wasn't level or let say plumb, with stress it cracked within the first week.

So the attorney client tried to return the sink but he big box store would have nothing to do with a return on a cracked product. So the hot shot tried to reverse the credit card and other unsuccessful measures.

So I want to another location of the big box store and spoke to the best manager ever. A woman, 26 years old with 4 children. Managing a store with 80 employee's is easy compared to raising 4 young brats.

Together we went to the display of the combo sink and top and noticed it too was slightly crooked. We then opened a stock box with the combo unit and saw this sink had a hairline crack on the bottom, unfinished surface, and would crack when installed.

So we went through the stock boxes and I found one in grate shape. She gave me the top and I was to return to her the cracked sink the next time I stopped by the store. Which I did a few days later.

I called up my lawyer client and came over he next day and installed the good top on his vanity. Problem solved.

He should have returned or exchanged it before the install, but sometimes you can't tell a product is defective.

As my own licensed contractor, I take defective products back to where I bought them and most always can get a immediate resolution. Otherwise I charge things on my Special American Express card who will reverse charges.

Sometimes defects are so small that you can hardly see them. We purchased a sink this week for install that my guy struggled with for over an hour. It kept leaking! We finally found an almost imperceptible imperfection that was keeping the flange from seating properly.

Usually you can do what Robert did--take it back to the store where you bought it and exchange it for a good one. In our case, we found the same defect in the next two boxes that we opened, so we ended up taking the whole vanity back and buying a comparable one at a different big box store.

Just saying----

The big box stores get much of their stuff from China.

Those of us who only care about the lowest price, well----

Yet, China has a rover on the moon. They have a virus lab that can do cutting edge things. (nuff said).

why didn't you just buy another one-- put it in and place the broken one in the box and send back or RETURN?

As you see trying to do something right doesn't work MOST of the time.

I would take it back.

When I was a home inspector, I inspected a house built in the ‘70s that had substantial upgrades in several rooms. No one was living in the house, it was vacant. One upgrade was a completely remodeled bathroom with new tub and ceramic tile walls with glass sliding shower doors. Of course I had to run the shower briefly, so I slid the glass doors to access the valves. The prospective buyer was there with me following me through every room. Everything went fine...I did my job as always and left.

The next day I got a call from the seller asking “what the f%#@“ I did to their shower. I had no idea what they were talking about, but he told me I’d broken one of the glass doors. I didn’t understand, as all was fine when I left. I agreed to back to the house that night and look.

Sure enough, one of the doors was in a million pieces, the tub was full of glass. He was furious and threatened to sue me if I didn’t pay for it. I went home and did some research and found that sometimes these brand new doors can be internally stressed and will crack on their own...it’s rare but it does happen. The doors were installed less than a week earlier so I called the installer company and the owner said “that’s the third set we’ve had do that this year, I’m no longer going to use that brand”...and he agreed to fix it at no charge.

Laura,

Temperature changes, tightened the drain an ooch too tight, handled roughly during tranist and stocking leading to internal stresses...

We laid a ceramic floor in a large kitchen. While in the next I heard a loud BANG! The floor tiles cracked all the way across the room. Our best guess is that the furnace warmed the tiles which were laid on a cool day.

I'd have the plumber remove it and install a new one, return to store as a defect. I'd consider this his warranty on the work. Maybe pay a few extra bucks to keep him happy but in the end a working sink is his job.

A crack clear across is a flaw, not an accident.

I agree to return it to the store as defective.