Cascade Designs Ate My Uberlite

Call and talking to an actual person

Yikes, sorry to hear that. I’ve had nothing but good experience with Cascade Designs in the past regarding warranty issues but it has been a few years since I’ve had an issue. That’s unacceptable for them to leave you hanging like that. Hopefully when you get in contact with someone they can sort it out and provide some compensation for botching they warranty claim.

On the topic of warranty/customer service, I had to deal with Arc’teryx a few months ago and while my claim was ultimately processed satisfactorily it was a long, drawn-out, and somewhat clunky experience. Some of that is due to COVID and some of it was due to increased demand. The outdoor industry is booming right now and the growth seems to have occurred at a way that some companies weren’t ready for. The customer service representative I spoke with at Arc’teryx said that when he started working there a few years ago there were around 14 people in his department and now there were around 60. He said it has been hard to scale up some of the operations so quickly and that it seemed to be an industry-wide issue to a certain degree.

Don’t even get me started on Arc’teryx; I’ve been a fan of their stuff for awhile, but their repair service has been enough to almost completely turn me to another company entirely.  The last repair they did for me was so poorly-executed and so time-consuming (five months!) that I decided to never again send them anything that needs mending; I’ll go to a third party from now on…and if I can find shells that fit me as well as the Arc’teryx options, I’ll switch brands in a heartbeat.  After having some good customer service experiences recently, I have zero patience for a company that can’t get things done in a timely fashion.

Sorry to hear that the pixies stole your pad, Chris; hopefully they get it back to you soon.  Call and ask what’s going on, and if you don’t get any answers in a reasonable amount of time, raise some hell and get things moving.

My biggest complaint with Thermarest is their frequent changing of pad models over the years.  Who remembers the Toughskin?  The Classic?  The Standard?  The Guide Light?  The 40th Anniversary?

Steamed, I left this comment on their webpage about their 3rd generation Trail Pro pad—(hit link and scroll down to 4 star reviews to see pic of 1st and 2nd gen. pads)—

https://www.thermarest.com/sleeping-pads/trek-and-travel/trail-pro-sleeping-pad/trail-pro.html

There was a version of thermarest prolite that weighed 16 ounces but had delamination problems

Then, the polite started weighing 18 ounces. They never acknowledged any change, at least when I looked for it.  Just, the weight listed started being 18 ounces

My deduction is they changed the foam inside to a more robust version that didn’t delaminate

In my opinion, they should have acknowledged this.  They could have advertised that they improved it.

Maybe they didn’t want the liability of the old versions.

But, I still like it.  My 16 ounce version delaminated so I bought a new one that was the 18 ounce version.  That has not delaminated.  But, I am also careful to never put my hand on it with my full body weight, maybe its not the new version

If this fails, ill buy another

Call and talk to an actual person

Exactly.

I still have my oldest Thermarests, grubby looking, but fully functional. I just gave one away to someone who couldn’t afford a modern one. So far the uberlite is working for me! Time will tell.

Yes, our other Thermarests have been great, including a couple of “irregulars” we bought on one of our first North American trips in 1999. The other Uberlite we have is also fine.

I will keep chasing!

my decade(s?) old Thermarest Guidelite is still functional, rolled up in my closet

is it 2 pounds?

Spoke with someone at Warranty. They said that the person dealing with Canadian repairs has been off sick for “several weeks”. Obviously they didn’t think it worthwhile to have anyone else deal with their work in the meantime or even to let customers know there would be a 3 month delay in responding.

I will wait to see what happens next

Maybe I’m now somewhat biased after a good customer service interaction with a company, but that kind of response is beyond all logic.  If it’s true, whomsoever is running that department needs to be sacked.

I know Cascade Designs was shut down for some time as a non-essential business but I don’t know their current status.

In my experience nothing is working well right now. Not full stop, but stumbling along. The postal service has been thoroughly damaged.

I’m sure there are lots of things happening to make life difficult for many companies right now so I’m not about to call for anyone to be sacked.

Come June of course if I still haven’t got my pad back I may feel a bit differently.

Exact same thing happened to me. Sent them an Uberlight around the end of September. The emailed to say it was checked in on October 27. Now it’s been almost 3 months of nothing  – not even a reply.

I could call but I’m not in a big hurry and don’t feel like chasing them around because they’re not doing their job. I suppose it’ll come to that eventually if this continues. Mine had an internal baffle delaminate so an obvious internal flaw. Should take them 2 minutes to look at it and make a decision.

I have Thermarest pads dating back to the dark ages, when they first made them (I now use NeoAir pads).  An Everest expedition used their original model and they advertised this, so I figured if they could withstand Everest they should work in the Cascades.  And they did.

I had one minor delamination or opened side seam on their first-generation pads.  I took it to their original factory in South Seattle and they put it in a press and resealed it right then and there (heat and pressure, if I recall).

I had a non-repairable leak near the valve in a later model and brought it to a newer factory in Seattle.  They said they didn’t have the same pad on hand so they’d mail one to me.  I said we were about to start a 14-day trip on the Wonderland Trail around Mt. Rainier and couldn’t wait, so they just gave me a returned but working fine Prolite, for free (I still have it).  And they still mailed me the new replacement.

I think I had other dealings with their customer service, and in all cases they were great.  I hope nothing has changed.

I decided to give them a call at the number here:
https://support.cascadedesigns.com/s/

Actually was quite painless. No waiting on hold. Talked to someone who put in a order for a new pad for me while I was on the phone. Should have that shortly.

I asked him why I didn’t get an emails back for 3 months despite reaching out multiple times. Sounds like things descended in chaos last year. Rep said they got >1000 voicemail backlog and so many emails that it overwhelmed them. He didn’t explicitly say this, but sounded like they got so far behind they just archived all that instead of dealing with it (Ouch…thousands of customers expecting to get warranty replacements and instead getting their claim sent to the archive). He said that my emails did go through but didn’t get dealt with because they basically archived every email thread.

Notably, he said that’s still continuing now where most email isn’t going to be read, even if you were talking to a rep previously. But they are up and running again with phone calls. So hardly an impressive solution, but for others reference it turns out emailing is pointless and nothing will happen until you call.

Fanfare! Arrived home to find a non-descript envelope. My Uberlite inside. No note. Nothing.  A blob of clear glue along a perimeter seam so they found a leak. I’ve inflated it and left with a weight on top to see if it holds air. Given the location of the leak I’m wondering if they may have overheated the fabric when heat sealing the seam.

One of my NeoAir mattresses developed a leak and I had some uncomfortable nights on a trip in May. Cascade designs was closed from March until June 15th due to the pandemic. So I shipped it to them on June 18th. Here’s the story up to the day I shipped it. I knew they’d be overwhelmed, but just trusted things would work out.

June 27th, Cascades Designs for the Win!

I’m a very satisfied customer of 4 decades.

Glad I checked out this thread. I had a NeoAir Lite last year on the CT that did the opposite of what most have problems with: it started not letting air out! I had to wake up an hour early by the end to be able to roll up the pad! I contacted Cascade Design by phone, had a great conversation with a helpful and knowledgeable employee, and as I was leaving the country, he advised the best route would be for me to make a video of me trying to deflate the pad, which once approved would serve as warranty, then I’d need to take photos of me destroying the pad, and they’d send a new one. I sent the video to them the next day, I’d even been given a claim/case number. After one week, no response. Two weeks, no response. I sent several emails both to the company and employee with no response, I called twice and got an automated response….by this point, it was too late, as we were off to Mexico. I’ve been a Cascade Design’s customer for 40 years and was really put off by the experience.