Charged and Adjustment Fee for returning item

[TG070]

Hi all,

Just want to check where we stand on this one.

I will leave the company anonymous at the moment.
A couple of weeks ago we had to replace a couple of gas springs on a printing machine.
I found the the actual ones were only available in America. After a quick trawl on google I came across a company selling gas springs. I chatted online to a sales rep, and after being told they did not stock exact part, they had a similar one. We ordered 2 replacements and they came next day. It was immediately obvious that they were not suitable as the thread each end was too small.
We immediately contacted company and arranged to send them back at our expense.
Today I received notification of our refund, minus £19.50 adjustment fee. The total order only came to £50.16 including VAT and postage and our refund was £30.66.

Can a company do this? Is it not against Distance Selling Regulations?

Luckily we paid via paypal and I have already opened a dispute.

Terry

 

[GarethShaw]

From memory the distance selling regulations doesn't apply to B2B transactions (assuming from you post you are buying as a business from another UK company).

They can charge a fee if it was made clear in their T&Cs of sale.

Hope that helps. Personally if they recommend a similar product then they must have known whether it was compatible and shouldn't charge you a fee if the error was there own.

 

[TG070]

Thanks Gareth.

This was their reply to the paypal dispute:-

"This item was supplied as per the order placed online.The credit was paid minus carriage, as this is a service that we had provided and paid for. A 30% re-stocking fee was applied to cover the inspection of the returned goods and the administration to cover the re-stocking and credit. This is common business to business practice."

I know we do operate a re-stocking fee. Does anyone else?

 

[TG070]

Just a quick update on this.
We opened a dispute with paypal and got a full refund.