CONSUMER AWARENESS ON PORCELAIN TILES

lorna webster 1 · Feb 14, 2012 12:43 am

We recently built a new home in which we chose 125sqm porcelain tiles for the floor. When the home was finished the tiles have this haze and swirl marks in the tile. The original price was $70sqm from a major tile company in Rockhampton. They came and looked at the floor which looks dirty all the time and based it was acceptable due to australian standards. Two weeks later they offered us compensation of $5000. We do not want any money we just want the floor fixed. They have now offered to go halves in fixing the floor with the builder and why should he pay halve it is not his problem. We have been treated very badly by the tile company and higher bodies above the store itself. apparently the tile industry is aware of this fault in porcelain tiles but do not want the consumer to know about it. The australian standard needs to be changed and consumers should be made aware that their porcelain floor could look like ours but all they do is advertising a very shiny beautiful floor. My next house i build i certainly wont contemplate using this tile company as they do not stand by their 15 year warranty. I certainly will build again with GJ GARDNER HOMES as they have stood by their customer and are fixing my floor even though its not their floor. The thought of a huge corporation taking advantage of hardworking people and misleading people.

Mclaren · Feb 14, 2012 9:19 am

Sorry to hear your dramas ... we paid our builder a fortune for our porcelain tiles but we were told right from the beginning that they would need to have the wax cleaned off once they were laid. So after handover we found someone who did that for us for $600 cash - seems strange that the builder doesn't do that before handover

We also had a lot of problems with tiles that were not laid properly and the tiler is back again today to replace one in the powder room (5 months after handover).

Perhaps your tiles look dirty because they still have the wax on them?

robbie55 · Feb 14, 2012 9:22 am

Thanks for the heads up Lorna - for anyone yet to lay tiles do you have any advice - is this easy to spot before the tiles are laid or not really evident till you see a large portion down? Does it affect every tile in the batch or do need to inspect various boxes to see if only some have defects?

rojak1 · Feb 15, 2012 11:28 am

I also bought a total of 115m2 optical haze tiles from a tile company, the advises i've got from their inspector are to put in more blinds to limit the light coming into the house so it is not too obvious, or to go ACCC / Fair Trading if I even bother to bring the issue further.

The report I received from the company described this imperfection as optical haze and it is not regulated by Australia Standard. Unaware consumer is the biggest victim in this issue

Mclaren, what lorna was complaining is optical haze, it is an imperfection of the tiles and cannot be "waxoff". The tiles always look dirty with swirl and water marks and it stay that way for the life of the tiles.

robbie55, there is no safe bet in ensuring all the tiles that a customer purchase are free from optical haze condition because such condition is not regulated by the industry, the seller/business has no obligation to exchange the tile for a better batch after the delivery, even before the tiles are installed.

I believe the only way to ensure all the tiles a customer buy are free from optical haze is to specifically request such condition put into contract of sales in writing, or if there is no such contract then written on the quote & receipt of the sales will do just fine.

As for checking, in the shop it is very hard to detect optical haze due to lighting configuration, and most tiles on display are cleaned and perfect. Before installation, every tiles should be "waxoff" first and cleaned, then put under natural lights at an angle to check for optical haze, but I doubt any tiler is capable of such labour intensive practice at no cost, especially if we are talking about 100+sqm of installation.

As for my case, I ended up getting venetian blind to block the sun out completely, this hide the problem in most area but the main entrance still look like a high traffic toilet floor with polished porcelain tiles, its never clean by just looking at it.

willcres · Feb 15, 2012 3:18 pm

Gosh, I feel sorry for you, Lorna....

We're going to have polished porc tiles too from Di lorenzo Bella Vista. I hope this won't happen to our to our tiles...

Mclaren, I also have to pay to my builder $500 to clean polished porc tiles.

Thanks for your info rojak1!

rojak1 · Feb 15, 2012 4:08 pm

In regards of cleaning the wax off the newly installed polished porcelain tiles.

When tiler apply grout and mopping it off after drying, it should carry most of the wax with it, there should only have some corner / hard to reach places that may still need some cleaning.

I think the $500 / $600 you both mention here could be a normal cleaning of left over grout + sealing new porcelain tiles for protection. saying so a nano-seal polish porcelain tiles may not require a re-seal after installation.

But this is what i was told hopefully some tiler by trade on this site can shed some light on this wax cleaning issue?

Mclaren · Feb 15, 2012 4:09 pm

Ours was definitely to have the wax cleaned off - the tiles are sealed. Apparently they are transported with a wax coating to protect them ....

willcres · Feb 15, 2012 9:51 pm

Not sure with mine, will check on that one tomorrow..
Thanks, rojak.

Allycat1 · Feb 28, 2012 2:16 pm

Hi Lorna, I am from Rockhampton as well and just starting to build with local builder. We too are getting porcelain tiles throughout. Do you have any advice for me. We are not buying from Beaumonts but a another local tile shop. How are they going to fix your tiles?

lorna webster 1 · Mar 04, 2012 3:28 pm

robbie55

Thanks for the heads up Lorna - for anyone yet to lay tiles do you have any advice - is this easy to spot before the tiles are laid or not really evident till you see a large portion down? Does it affect every tile in the batch or do need to inspect various boxes to see if only some have defects?

Hi Robbie55

yes it does affect every tile in the batch and even the spare tiles we have in brand new boxes when opened have the same problem no it is not easy to spot until after they are cleaned and see the big picture of it.

lorna webster 1 · Mar 04, 2012 3:44 pm

Hi everyone

Thanks for all your concerns and sympathies. Another two weeks have gone by and still no outcome as yet. After much research and consultation with the NSW< QLD and Victoria tile counsels it appears to be a common problem in the tile industry. Slique Pty Ltd located in Sydney the director of this company devised a specific method and machine in which to rectify this problem. He apparently is the only one in Australia who can fix the problem and guarantees his work 100%. We sent a tile to him and received it back on Friday-no swirls and no haze and shiny. The cost factor is $140 per sqm to have these tiles fixed. I too was told bythe tile company to put furniture and rugs on my floor to cover the swirls and haze as they said this was within the australian standards. If i wanted to cover my floor with rugs i would have put carpet down and not chose porcelain tiles. No i dont have optical hazing. The problem i have is from the factory itself. This is a common issue where the machine used to polish the stone something goes wrong (dirt,hair etc) whilst in the polishing process. Then they go to the culler (a man standing there checking and grading the tiles). The fault tiles are supposed to be put to one side and boxed as such and sold off cheaper. What i was told that usually factories and office buildings purchase these as they dont have the light coming in and dont see it. Well it appears that the culling process is not that accurate considering how much enters our country and actually gets laid on consumers floors and then we are fobbed off stating the australian standards. We now have a law through the ACCC that states if something we purchase is not to our expectations or portrayed by companies to our expectations we can request in writing three things which are REPAIR, REPLACE OR REFUND and with this law the tile companies quoting the australian standard it gets thrown out the window. We have accepted that Slique can repair the floor. The tile company is in negotiation with our builder but at this stage with a $21500 bill they wont to only contribute $10000. The remainder to be foot by the builder. I do not agree that anyone should have to pay anything towards someone elses mistakes and poor quality products. Why should the builder have to pay anything. The tile company guarantees on his website that he strives for 100% quality products and 100% satisfied customers. With a statement like this you would want to ensure that you are delivering what you state and at this stage he is not. We will have to wait and see what the outcome is. Either way my builder has guaranteed that the floor will get fixed. He values his reputation unlike the tile company. One last thing its left a sour taste in our mouths considering we moved from NSW to Yeppoon 1 year ago and built our first every new home to end up with this floor and walls is devastating. I have two brothers and one neice and their families also moving to yeppoon relatively soon in which they are building new homes also. They will definetely be using Trevor Simpson from GJ GARDNER HOMES YEPPOON as they have seen how he has gone out of his way for us the quality of home he built and now with this issue (NOT HIS FAULT) is still standing by his customer. I can assure you that none of them will be using the tile company to purchase any tiles and i guarantee i wont in the future. Anyway guys i will keep you up to date with the going ons in my saga.

lorna webster 1 · Mar 04, 2012 3:49 pm

rojak1

In regards of cleaning the wax off the newly installed polished porcelain tiles.

When tiler apply grout and mopping it off after drying, it should carry most of the wax with it, there should only have some corner / hard to reach places that may still need some cleaning.

I think the $500 / $600 you both mention here could be a normal cleaning of left over grout + sealing new porcelain tiles for protection. saying so a nano-seal polish porcelain tiles may not require a re-seal after installation.

But this is what i was told hopefully some tiler by trade on this site can shed some light on this wax cleaning issue?

Hi Rojak

yes the tiler actually does clean off the transit wax when applying grout and mopping it dry. Nano sealed polish porcelain do not require resealling at all. I believe the $500 or $600 is another variation that the builders are going for as they do pay around $2 per sqm to have the house cleaned so by charging this they are recouping some of that money. I believe that once the cleaner has cleaned the house there should be no extra cleaning needed only if it looks like my floor which turns out to be a fault in the tile.

daveinthehills · Mar 04, 2012 9:10 pm

lorna, I would be careful about what you type on this forum. I just read this sticky post today:
viewtopic.php?f=31&t=29877 and you may need to edit your post to be more careful about these things. I don't know anything about your specific situation, or any of the people involved, but one of my friends got in a big legal mess making comments on a forum, and the law is surprisingly in favour of companies.

Mclaren · Mar 05, 2012 10:04 am

lorna webster 1

rojak1

In regards of cleaning the wax off the newly installed polished porcelain tiles.

When tiler apply grout and mopping it off after drying, it should carry most of the wax with it, there should only have some corner / hard to reach places that may still need some cleaning.

I think the $500 / $600 you both mention here could be a normal cleaning of left over grout + sealing new porcelain tiles for protection. saying so a nano-seal polish porcelain tiles may not require a re-seal after installation.

But this is what i was told hopefully some tiler by trade on this site can shed some light on this wax cleaning issue?

Hi Rojak

yes the tiler actually does clean off the transit wax when applying grout and mopping it dry. Nano sealed polish porcelain do not require resealling at all. I believe the $500 or $600 is another variation that the builders are going for as they do pay around $2 per sqm to have the house cleaned so by charging this they are recouping some of that money. I believe that once the cleaner has cleaned the house there should be no extra cleaning needed only if it looks like my floor which turns out to be a fault in the tile.

Our tiler didn't remove the wax from the tiles on our floor and it cost us $600 to have someone come and do it. We have the swirls and haze too

rojak1 · Mar 05, 2012 2:25 pm

Mclaren

lorna webster 1

rojak1

In regards of cleaning the wax off the newly installed polished porcelain tiles.

When tiler apply grout and mopping it off after drying, it should carry most of the wax with it, there should only have some corner / hard to reach places that may still need some cleaning.

I think the $500 / $600 you both mention here could be a normal cleaning of left over grout + sealing new porcelain tiles for protection. saying so a nano-seal polish porcelain tiles may not require a re-seal after installation.

But this is what i was told hopefully some tiler by trade on this site can shed some light on this wax cleaning issue?

Hi Rojak

yes the tiler actually does clean off the transit wax when applying grout and mopping it dry. Nano sealed polish porcelain do not require resealling at all. I believe the $500 or $600 is another variation that the builders are going for as they do pay around $2 per sqm to have the house cleaned so by charging this they are recouping some of that money. I believe that once the cleaner has cleaned the house there should be no extra cleaning needed only if it looks like my floor which turns out to be a fault in the tile.

Our tiler didn't remove the wax from the tiles on our floor and it cost us $600 to have someone come and do it. We have the swirls and haze too

Do you still have it after the tile is cleaned?

lorna webster 1 · Mar 08, 2012 4:50 pm

daveinthehills

lorna, I would be careful about what you type on this forum. I just read this sticky post today:
viewtopic.php?f=31&t=29877 and you may need to edit your post to be more careful about these things. I don't know anything about your specific situation, or any of the people involved, but one of my friends got in a big legal mess making comments on a forum, and the law is surprisingly in favour of companies.

Thanks David

First time user to a forum and was not aware of what you pointed out. Glad you took the time to post this. Ive learnt something just a very angry person at the moment and i suppose anger affects your judgement anyways thanks

daveinthehills · Mar 08, 2012 5:31 pm

lorna webster 1

Thanks David

First time user to a forum and was not aware of what you pointed out. Glad you took the time to post this. Ive learnt something just a very angry person at the moment and i suppose anger affects your judgement anyways thanks

No worries. I also read this article:
http://www.smh.com.au/business/how-the- ... 1ue6z.html
just recently, and frankly I reckon the law needs to be changed. Anyway, I digress, this discussion is a little off topic.
I hope you get your tiles sorted out. I am certainly a little wiser after reading this thread.

Rizzo · Mar 08, 2012 5:37 pm

We had the waxy stuff left on from transport when we built our last house. We had used the same tiles in our previous build and they were fine, but the the batch we used in that house we couldn't get the wax off. The builder tried and couldn't either. We lived with it for 18 months until we rented the house out and got a tile cleaner in and he buffed them and they came up perfect.

lorna webster 1 · Mar 09, 2012 8:18 am

Allycat1

Hi Lorna, I am from Rockhampton as well and just starting to build with local builder. We too are getting porcelain tiles throughout. Do you have any advice for me. We are not buying from Beaumonts but a another local tile shop. How are they going to fix your tiles?

Hi Allycat1

I am referring to chinese porcelain tiles in my awareness story. After the cleaner has finished cleaning your house and before you make the final payment you need to check the tiles for any haze or swirls in them. The haze and swirls are a fault in the manufacturing process and i see from a lot of responses that we are getting told this is natural characterisctics in porcelain tiles. Totally false. When you see brochures and tv advertisements, magazines portraying a beautiful shiny floor this is what we all expect as a consumer when deciding to lay porcelain tiles. When i was told this was a natural look i was dumbfounded and thought that everyone out there with the beautiful shiny floors must have the faulty floor. We researched this problem alot. We first told it was grout haze, then transit wax, then opitcal hazing until we found the right people to talk to and sent them the photos and tile and the conclusion was the manufacturing fault in the polishing process. It was hard to detect in the building process during with so much dust and dirt around until the cleaning had did his job. We seem to be close to a resolution with this issue and will post this as soon as possible where it could be of some help to other people. All the best

Mclaren · Mar 22, 2012 2:06 pm

After seeing this thread I got in touch with the Tile Council and they told me that the packaging should have:

a manufacturer's name or trade mark,
a work size,
the country of origin,
whether they are glazed or unglazed,
rectified or whether they are modular or non modular,
the mark of 1st quality,
or the type of tile and reference to the conforming Standard.

Our packaging has none of the above and we have optical hazing - we're just debating whether it's worth spending $450 to have the Tile Council have a look at the tiles and write a report which we could take to the builder/supplier. As we've hit so many brick walls with the builder we are not confident of getting anywhere.

Be warned ... check your tiles and packaging!