Member Comments

Woww!! - I read this just in time. Farmers are selling some lovely sofas and armchairs in their boxing day (week) sales. I was about to go in to buy one. Now rethinking......they are definitley PU leather and clearly marked as such however the sales person told me how tough and resilient they were. Thanks Consumer.

I bought a set of leather sofas from a NZ retailer. So did 2 of my friends. The sofas are about 4 years old - all 3 sets are peeling and cracking, no matter where they were placed. Skin is flaking off. I was told it was a leather sofa with a special coating at time of purchase, and sold a pelle master kit. I am happy to go and complain, though I would liek to know, what is the average life expectancy of a sofa, is tehre any info on this? They were not sold as cheap tat, but before I take this further I am looking for information of how long a sofa should reasonably last. The rest of the sofa is firm and excellent, but the upholstery has had it, for all of them....I have since heard from others in NZ with the same issue. What do I do? I ahve also posted this under consumer guarantees act, as I thinkthis is where it's heading

Thanks for this article. I have been looking for dining chairs on trademe and was wondering what bi-cast leather was - now i know so won't be buying that.

I found this article very interesting. The different jargon used in sales advertising is very confusing. Thanks for giving the facts to ask the right questions before handing over a lot of cash.

So pleased to see this problem being exposed. We also bought 2 large couches from Freedom believing they were genuine leather. But no they are bi-cast. They were on sale but not cheap by any means. There was not a single mention by the staff of anything other than they were genuine top quality Italian leather. They are now peeling and within a year or so will be in very bad repair. Freedom refuse to replace the couches but have given us a "hide" to have it repaired at our expense. We are hugely disappointed and would have expected a "reputable" company like Freedom to have stood by their products and have offered a replacement.

Perhaps long overdue - as consumers have been exploited on this issue for ever - and unless labelling laws change will continue to be.

I'm checking my "leather" stuff tonight, but reckon it is bicast sold as "leather."

We recently bought a 3 seater and 1 seater from Freedom and the leather is referred to as Savant leather. I looked on the internet to find out what quality this was and couldn't find anything relating to 'Savant' leather. Is this genuine leather or bi-cast? When we purchased it, the customer rep' assured us it was genuine leather but now I am not so sure! Can anyone tell me?