Re: Online Shopping Contract Advice

Rich wrote:
Hi,

In the sales I saw a great TV offer on a High Street retailer's website. I was a good offer so I went online and bought it. I had a confirmation email, and the money was taken from my account. Delevery date was given as within 3 weeks

Near the end of the month, I noticed my bank account seemed a bit too healthy. My statement shows the TV was refunded 10 days later. No explanatory email or call.

I rang the retailer, who said they'd call be back, but didn't. After several calls the retailer finally told be they'd cancelled transaction as they suspected fraud. My bank assures me that they have nothing to indicate any fraud, and wouldn't have let the money leave my account if they did. I'm in a new build home, and checked my experian file, nothing adverse whatsoever.

The retailers T&C state they will refund the item if they can't supply it.

The retailer has offered to sell my the TV again, but the price has risen by £200.

My view is that the T&C's clause "cannot supply", in misleading, as in this case "would not supply" was the case. I also find it bizarre that the I wasn't sent an email advising of the refund.

The sales have finished and my new TV bargain has slipped away. Any any advice on whether I can insist on the TV at the sale price as per my original purchase ?

re Fraud -
We have a problem - when we take payments over the internet, we are bound by our terms of contract with the merchant bank to do everything to minimise the risk of fraud. Too many chargebacks and they can demand whopping security deposit, or worse, simply cancel your merchant account.
Now, however honest the buyer is, we have no way of knowing. All we see is a name and address, phone number and email address. My shop relies on the 3rd Man to assess the risk associated with a web transaction, and looks at things like electoral role, how many cards used at that address, web based email or proper email address, mobile number or landline. The transaction is then scored and it is up to us whether to process the payment or not. This retailer should consider using deferred transactions -not only is it more ethical, more useful in that it gives them a chance to assess the transaction risk, but also saves them losing the processing fee when the payment is refunded. It doesn't always work - I have lost money on several large transactions where all the details matched and the risk score was low, and not lost money on more uncertain ones.
We *must* have the option to refuse a transaction over which we have no control. If we were obliged to fulfil every order, I would have sent 30 heavy gold necklaces to Nigeria and lost my merchant account by now.
NB people in new build homes are often a problem because they are not registered on the royal mail database. My son's is still not on the database and he has lived in his new build for two years.
.

Relevant Pages

  • Online Shopping Contract Advice
    ... In the sales I saw a great TV offer on a High Street retailer's website. ... Near the end of the month, I noticed my bank account seemed a bit too ... I rang the retailer, who said they'd call be back, but didn't. ... The retailers T&C state they will refund the item if they can't supply it. ...
    (uk.legal)
  • Re: How do I format rec-free books?
    ... raising an invoice and paying an invoice. ... The first transction will be from sales account to customer account. ... The second transaction will from customer to bank account. ...
    (uk.business.accountancy)
  • Re: New Method for Authenticated Public Key Exchange without Digital Certificates
    ... have the account disabled. ... then the next time you do a financial transaction ... ... eventually arrives at your financial institution ... ... in order to do credit card transactions, the merchant has to ...
    (sci.crypt)
  • Re: ComboBox Problem... Please, help me out!
    ... and tblTransDtl (transaction detail). ... You also have tables for SheetRegister and Account. ... Every sheet belongs to an only single ...
    (microsoft.public.access.formscoding)
  • Re: Query for Subform - G/L Account Transactions (Access XP)
    ... GLID COUNTER NOT NULL, -- a Counter is an AutoNumber ... xact_date DATETIME NOT NULL, -- transaction date ... Allow the user to select the description, reference, and transaction ... account in my chart of accounts. ...
    (microsoft.public.access.queries)