SCS Sofas

iluvdarius2003 · 3 February 2007 at 9:37PM

I was in SCS today and decided that I liked one of the Sofas and went through the hassle of all the paperwork ect. Now my Mum came in and saw them and thought that they didn't look good quality ect, and they were ex display models (which I knew, but didn't think much of at the time.) I decided about 5 mins after I left the shop that I wasn't happy with them. I then phoned my partner and found out that as a surprise had went ahead and bought a new sofa for cash.

So I phoned the shop back literally 5 mins after I left to be told sorry no cancellations. Now this was never pointed out to me, or I would have left straight away. I had to speak to the salesman who told me that I should see about returning the other couch as there was no way I was getting this one cancelled. By this point I had really decided that I didn't want it at all and my Mum stepped in and dealt with it. I thought that it was against the consumer credit act to not have a cooling off period. Plus the fact that the sofa is an ex display model and not being made for me. It really was going to cost too much, so I'm glad to be trying to get out of it. I actually felt sorry for the salesman as he was an older man and seemed to have some problems with his health, and that made me decide to go for it.

Anyway my Mum was told that it probably could be cancelled but they can't deal with it until Monday as they have to ask the finance company if it's ok to cancel. Bare in mind that the finance agreement hasn't even been looked at yet, as it won't be processed until Monday. So basically I have been taken for a ride and they were giving me all different information. So on the promise of one of the salesmen it will be cancelled, but can anyone give me any advice or information to quote in case it all goes pearshapped?

Sarahx

advent1122 · 4 February 2007 at 7:52PM

Have a look at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/consumer/your_rights/credit.shtml

It looks like you are stuffed.

maninthestreet · 4 February 2007 at 11:25PM

You entered a legally binding contract with SCS, they have a legal right to retain any deposit you may have paid in the event of you wanting to cancel the contract. The cooling off period you refer to only applies to business conducted away from business premises, and does not apply to contracts signed on business premises.

daveboy · 4 February 2007 at 11:37PM

I've never heard of the health of an employee influencing someone to make a purchase.

I would have thought the mind-numbingly cheesey TV adverts that we see for SCS from time to time would be enough to keep people away.

You'll be lucky to get out of this without incurring some sort of loss.

furrypolka · 5 February 2007 at 11:31AM

Was the finance agreement executed on the spot, i.e. did the trader sign it on behalf of the finance company?

The finance agreement is executed once:
- You have signed it
- An authorised representative of the finance company has signed it

Once the finance agreement has two signatures as above, it becomes legally binding. However if you can withdraw from it before its execution, any contract linked to the finance agreement also ceases to exist (i.e. there would no longer be a contract for the sofas).

This is usually unlikely as a lot of credit agreements are executed on the spot by an authorised representative, or done extremely quickly afterwards.

If it's been executed, I am afraid you have a legally binding contract for the sofas and if you do not go ahead with this you will be in breach of contract and will have to pay the trader reasonable damages to cover his losses.

If you can prove that they sold the same sofa to someone else for the same price, you could argue that the trader's losses were minimal (administration costs only) and they should repay you the majority of your deposit.

Dazzy_2 · 9 August 2007 at 6:41PM

I used to work for SCS and it's the most boring job I have ever had in my life.
Now where i worked, the credit agreements needed to be phoned through after the sale had been completed (this was normally done after the customer had left the shop), now if the credit agreement hadn't been called through, then there is no reason why they could not cancel the agreement.
Especially if it was a display model that you purchased, because they wouldn't have even had to order the sofa from any manufacturer, so that could have been left to the managers discretion.
I am going through a dispute with SCS at the moment as they want me to pay my wages back due to them terminating my employment after 3 months, because I didn't make them enough money (£70000 over the 3 months as they wanter £100000).
I would never buy a sofa from them, and also, if you like to be stalked around the shop, then SCS is the place to be.

Aileycace · 26 February 2010 at 8:12AM

After visiting SCS I found many many sofas - many of which were lovely . I have to say that we were definitely purchase the furniture with out any doubts.Great to know about it , Recently I have seen the same sought of sofas in sofasinstock which are fabulous.

KingEric_2 · 2 March 2010 at 6:31PM

Just wanted to share my experience with SCS. Went into our local shop on the 27/12/2009 and ordered two Scatterback sofas from the 'Strand' range. We were told that we would have delivery within 3 weeks of this date and that the delivery team would call to arrange delivery.

4 weeks down the line and we had not received any contact from SCS. Gave the store a call and they said that there had been a delay at the manufacturers and it would be another few weeks before they could be delivered. Surely it doesn't take a lot of effort to call your customers and update of any delay??

So, on the 9th of February, the sofas were finally delivered... but with the wrong coloured cushions! Gave the store another phone call to ask about swapping over the cushion covers, but was told it would be another 3 weeks before we could get hold of them!! The 3 week deadline passed today, and have not heard a peep. I just cant understand why they promise goods to be delivered or available at a date that they cant guarantee!

Whatever you do, please avoid SCS, it's really not worth the hassle.

kolin_2 · 26 May 2010 at 2:26PM

I'll add my experience of SCS Sofas.

Went into store around 11 feb time, and ordered a leather sofa. The salesman told us, "you will not have to wait longer than 10 weeks", fair enough (its a long time, but at least they've told us a long time).

at the 8th week we hadn't heard anything at all (acceptable), so we rung and were told that it'd be in the warehouse around the 26th apr for delivery within 7 days after that. (ok so that is 11 weeks, ho hum)

on the 10th week, we still hadn't heard anything so rang again, only to be told it wouldn't be in the distribution centre for another 4 weeks, and who-ever had said it'd be in at the end of april was wrong.

about a week ago we rang to see where our sofa was, and were told again that it'd be in 26th may (5 weeks overdue), and that the delay was due to the ash cloud. they have rung me today to say it has arrived, (and that i have an overdue balance of ~£500 that needs paying today, heh the cheek of it) and they wanted to deliver it next tuesday (nearly 6 weeks overdue).

i 'politely' told the person on the phone :
a) you will deliver it earlier than that (they then gave me a date of this friday)
b) i do not have an outstanding balance that needs paying today, because i'm paying monthly, and i wouldn't pay it because i still havent received the goods in anyway.
c)to give me the address of the head office to write a letter of complaint to. (which they tried to fob me off by getting me to write to the manager of the store)

oh in the midst of all this, i have not pointed out that
a)me and my girlfriend have been sat on dining and garden chairs since january, as this is our first house and we have never had a sofa.

so hopefully we'll have a sofa nearly 5 1/2 weeks longer than the longest date we were quoted.

so if you wish to avoid a sofa store of pure incompetence on all levels, please avoid SCS, Wakefield

greenfrollein · 27 May 2010 at 9:22PM

We too had a frustrating experience with SCS and I really want to share this in order to warn others:

We strongly advise to stay away from SCS, our experience with them has been so frustrating and they have proven to be utterly inconsiderate with regards to customer service.
We ordered a sofa based on the sales guy praising the sofa to be UK manufactured (we made it plain that this was the winning sales argument for us), in fact, this sales man told us SCS prided itself of being the only large sofa company using UK manufacturers and he said the delivery time would be 8 weeks. Back home we got suspicious, as the paperwork read delivery time of 12 weeks and there was no mention of UK manufacture, neither on their website nor in the paperwork. We send an enquiry via the SCS website and asked for confirmation, got no reply. We rang the sales guy who said he would try and bring the delivery date forward and ring us back (which he never did) and yes, the sofa was UK made, it would have a label to proof it. We weren't convinced and resent our enquiry via the website and after 24 days we got this reply "we can confirm your sofa is being manufactured in Malaysia". When we rang the branch to cancel the purchase and express our disappointment over this "misrepresentation" they said that we had nothing in writing to proof that we had been lied to and they would not accept a cancellation and keep our deposit. We had several more phone conversations, always with different people (we learnt that the sales person we initially dealt with as well as his manager had been moved to another branch) as well as email and letter correspondance and at no time would SCS acknowlege that their sales person had told us porkies but insisted we took the sofa all the same. Eventually we filed a claim with the small claims court to get our deposit back and SCS filed a defence. Shortly before the case would have gone to the hearing we then got a letter from SCS offering to settle and eventually they sent a cheque to cover the deposit and court fees. It took 3 1/2 months to resolve this and we are glad we had the nerves to stick it out. Companies like SCS who clearly give a sh** for their customers and are only after the money in the cheapest possible way really shouldn't get away it.
During all of these dealings we have found the staff and managers at SCS extremely unhelpful and evasive. We are posting this here in order to encourage others not to accept SCS's shockingly low standard of customer service and to take their issues to court if necessary.
[EMAIL="greenfrollein@googlemail.com"][/EMAIL]

SCS Sofas

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