Refunds and timescales

[creacom]

Hi everyone,

Is there a time limit on refunds ?

The reason I ask is that I bought a couple of items from an online shop in March. They were not up to standard, the shop apologised, promised me a refund if I sent them back - I sent by recorded delivery.

Im still waiting and was just wanting to know if the the law states that they have 28 days or something to make a refund ? Ive checked their terms and conditions and all that but there is no mention of it.

Thanks in advance for your advice.

Jacqui

 

[bwglaw]

I am not a consumer law expert so I may be wrong here. Also the law may differ in Scotland, only slightly.

If you purchased goods as a consumer you have 28 days to return any item. It appears you have returned the items. Have you checked that they have actually recieved the goods? This can be done on Royal Mail website.

It now appears you are just waiting for the payment refund. This should be refunded within a reasonable time upon receipt of the goods by the seller. 7 days is reasonable in the eyes of the law.

The next step would be to write to the seller and outline the facts and copy the Recorded Delivery slip as evidence that you have returned the items. State in the letter to 'refund me within 14 days from date of this letter or I will have no alternative but to commence legal proceedings at additional cost to you'

You should also send the letter by recorded delivery. You may wish to consider a gentle reminder by telephone before sending out a letter before action

Hope this helps


Jonathan

 

[creacom]

Hi Jonathan,

I double checked that they got the goods back and they even sent me an email to confirm !

I will give them yet another call and if that doesnt work follow it up with a recorded delivery letter.

As always, your advice has been great, thanks.

Jacqui :wink:

 

[The Resolver]

If you bought as a consumer (ie the items were not to be used in your business) then forget going to court. The simplest step to take, if the refund is not forthcoming, is to contact your credit card company and request a chargeback giving reasons. They will then recredit you and only take it off you again if the retailer proves to them that the money should not be returned.

The fact that the goods did not meet the description is, by the way, irrelevant. Under the Consumer Protection(Distance Selling) Regulations you had the right to cancel the sale on notice issued up to 7 days after delivery of the goods to you even if they were in perfect condition and exactly as described.

If the website did not inform you of such rights then the period of 7 days extends to up to three months.

Regulation 14 (3) requires repayment 'as soon as possible' but in any event no later than 30 days.

The banks do not publicise the chargeback scheme all that much for obvious reasons. I gave a talk a few years back at a banking technology conference and warned that if they didn't pressure their customers to ensure their B2C e-commerce sites complied with the CP(DS) Regs, there would be an explosion of chargebacks. I was wrong.The explosion did not happen. Why? It hasn't happened because, whilst most B2C e-comm websites still do not comply with the Regs, most of the public are still unaware of their rights.

Those here who build or template-sell e-comm sites should be including CP(DS) compliant terms as standard. Did you know that sites in breachof the CP(DS)Regs -and also of the e-Commerce Regulations - (and the content requirements go beyond the cancellation rights) can be closed down by Trading Standards. Don't lose sleep over it . The TSOs are too busy on other matters to regulate. But if you want to hassle a competitor check out his site's compliance! TSOs will act on a complaint.

 

[SillyJokes]

Lordy, my first thing to do is simply contact them and remind them you haven't had your refund with a polite email or call.

Most of the time it will be a simple oversight and legal threats are just cracking a nut with sledgehammer.

If they don't perform after a gentle reminder then resort to the above.

As for resorting to chargebacks I am always extremely cheesed off when people do these when all they needed was a refund. Encouraging people to take this route to resolution really sucks. It costs the merchant a set fee of £10 or more per transaction, is extremely difficult to fight and should a card holder become a regular charger-back then I would assume it wouldn't be long before their business would not be welcome with either the card issuer or online merchants.

 

[The Resolver]

Of course as always, but Jacqui had already done that. The question was as to how long to wait (30 days) and,implicitly. what else.

 

[SillyJokes]

Oh, OK. I am shocked really though. When we receive a return it is actioned that same day because it keeps our duties straight and keeps the customer happy because they receive prompt attention to their problem. This in turn reduces the customer service demand because you sort it out before they even think of chasing it up. SOMETIMES, very very rarely, a refund is over looked and it is a genuine mistake which we resolve as soon as we hear of it.

Any company not performing customer service at this rate is simply shooting themselves in the foot.

A chargeback could be used as a threat I suppose but I would never suggest it as the easiest way to get a refund because if used regularly instead of resolving the problem directly they would be an unsupportable drain for a business, give their payment provider cause for concern and impact on things like transaction costs.

The number of chargebacks a company gets is one of the points considered by payment providers like WorldPay when deciding whether they can give them a better transaction rate.

 

[The Resolver]

Quite agree and thats an excellent policy. You deserve great success.

Love your site by the way. What a fun business.

 

[bwglaw]

We had a resellers account with Fasthost and we wanted to dispute a payment. They said that if we issue a chargeback they would suspend ALL of our accounts, virtually bringing us to a halt!

Chargebacks should be a last resort in any event

Jonathan

 

[creacom]

Thanks for all the advice guys.

For the record they have had 1 recorded delivery letter, 6 emails and 2 telephone calls.

Yesterday I received another email telling me that they will be chasing it up. I told them they have until Tuesday to get something sorted or I take it a step further.

The goods were bought for use in the business so eventually it could go to court I guess.

Cheers everyone

Jacqui