Buying a New Mattress After Bedbugs: Barnet

Most people who find bedbugs think about the mattress first. It is where the bites happen and where the spotting shows, and a clean new one looks like a fresh start. Sometimes a replacement is sensible. The timing is what decides whether it helps or just costs money.

Why the New One Has to Wait

Bedbugs do not only live in the mattress. They live in the bed frame, the headboard, the bedside table, the skirting and the carpet edge. Take the old mattress away and put a new one on an untreated frame, and the bugs in the frame simply move onto it. Within weeks it has the same seams, the same spotting and the same problem.

Getting the old one out of the house causes trouble too. Carrying a mattress down the stairs and along the hall shakes bugs and eggs onto the carpet, the banisters and anything it brushes past. So unless we have advised that it should go, the old mattress stays where it is until the room has been treated.

When a Replacement Is Worth It

Most mattresses can be treated and used again. There are cases where replacing one makes sense, and we will say so when we see it:

• The mattress is torn or split, so bugs are living inside it where treatment cannot reach well.
• It is badly stained with spotting and you would not want to sleep on it even once it is clear.
• It was near the end of its life anyway, and this is the push to replace it.
• It is a thin folding or foam mattress that costs less to replace than to keep.

A mattress that is simply old, or that you feel uneasy about, is still treatable. If it is sound, treating it and fitting a zipped cover is often the better use of the money.

Getting Rid of the Old One Properly

If the old mattress is going, do it after treatment, or on the day if we advise it, and do it in a way that does not leave a trail through the house.

1. Wrap it completely in heavy plastic sheeting and tape the seams before it leaves the bedroom.
2. Write on the plastic that it has bedbugs, so nobody takes it home.
3. Carry it straight out; do not leave it in the hall or on the landing.
4. Arrange a bulky waste collection with the council or a licensed waste carrier, and tell them what it is.
5. If the shop is taking the old one away on delivery, wrap it first and warn the drivers.

Do not leave it on the pavement unwrapped. Someone else may pick it up.

Protecting the New Mattress

Once the room has been treated, and after the course of chemical visits if that is the route you took, the new mattress can come in. A few habits help keep it clear:

• Fit a zipped, bedbug-proof encasement as soon as it is delivered, before it has slept a night on the frame.
• Keep the delivery packaging out of the bedroom and dispose of it outside.
• Pull the bed slightly away from the wall so it only touches the floor.
• Check the seams and the frame joints every week or two for the first few months.
• Keep the old bedding out of use unless it has been through a hot wash.

An encasement also helps with a mattress you are keeping. If any bugs are trapped inside a sealed cover, they cannot get out to feed, and the smooth surface makes new spotting easy to see. For what the weeks after treatment look like, the London guide on what happens after bedbug treatment is worth a read.

Should the Bed Frame Go Too?

Usually not. A frame can be treated with either route. Heat brings it to a temperature bedbugs cannot survive along with the rest of the room; chemical puts a residual into its joints. Old slatted or upholstered frames with lots of cracks are harder work, and we will tell you if one is worth replacing. The heat and chemical pages for Barnet explain each route. Treatments start at £220. If a claim for the cost is on your mind, see does home insurance cover bedbugs before throwing anything out.

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