European threat to right of refund for faulty goods?

jazza77

Came across a story in a local newspaper today re. a European directive which aims to abolish our right to get a refund on faulty goods, replacing it with an obligation to replace or repair. Whilst that may be ok in some circumstances I would prefer to retain the option of a refund.

Story is here:-

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/display.var.2533965.0.bid_to_stop_refunds_for_faulty_goods.php

Perhaps we should all be writing to our MPs etc. to make our views known.

DVardysShadow

There was a thread about this on discussion time, and the conclusion was that it was just another straight bananas EU scare story. The legalities are fairly complex, but basically EU law sets a minimum standard - the debate is what that minimum should be - countries are free to provide legislation which goes beyond the minimum.

Not everything the EU does is bad, for example, yeatrday's announcement about the breakup of the banks [a good thing IMO] would not have happened, if the EU had not insisted. To damn the EU with faint praise, I would say that we are getting better government out of the EU at the moment than out of Westminster.

Optimist

DVardysShadow wrote: »

There was a thread about this on discussion time, and the conclusion was that it was just another straight bananas EU scare story. The legalities are fairly complex, but basically EU law sets a minimum standard - the debate is what that minimum should be - countries are free to provide legislation which goes beyond the minimum.

Not everything the EU does is bad, for example, yeatrday's announcement about the breakup of the banks [a good thing IMO] would not have happened, if the EU had not insisted. To damn the EU with faint praise, I would say that we are getting better government out of the EU at the moment than out of Westminster.

Not a scare story at all the EU actually did have rules about the curvature and size of bananas which could be sold. Directive No 2257/94 of 16 September 1994. This plus other regulations about the size and shape of fruit meant that good fruit could not be sold and had to be thrown.

These rules have since been relaxed

Andy_L

Although IIRC the directive was mostly based on the existing UK consumer regs that define the meaning of "Class 1" bananas (as oposed to "value" or "basics" fruit)