Where Do I Stand?

essexhoney

I bought a pc game off an ebay seller over the weekend. The listing clearly stated under system requirements P.C Windows 95/98/Me/XP however when it arrived this morning i attempted to install it on the pc (i am running windows XP) and the pc spat it back out at me! :mad: On checking the case it says Windows 95/98 and not ME/XP are mentioned at all.

I have emailed the seller. As yet have had no reply, but in his listing he has a set of outlined terms and conditions which are:

By bidding on the item(s) above you agree to the terms and conditions on this page. All goods supplied should be used in accordance with the manufacturers instructions. All goods are guaranteed in good working order but may not be new unless stated in the auction description. Purchasers are responsible for ensuring compatibility of all computer and software products with their own specific computer system. Any returned items will be tested and a refund only issued if the item is proved faulty, we will not refund the cost of return postage. Pictures are for display and identification purposes only and the product sold may be different from the pictures shown, please see packaging details. We do not end auctions early. We do not provide facilities for items to be collected, all purchases must be posted. Customers are responsible for ensuring that their postal address and e-mail address is current and correctly registered with ebay and paypal, we cannot be responsible for any mis-directed e-mails or orders due to incorrectly registered e-mail addresses or postal addresses.Returned items which are found not to be faulty may be subject to a 25% restocking fee.

Where do i stand being that when i bought the item effectively i agreed to those terms and conditions?

I paid through paypal and it was only for £4.70 so it wasnt a great deal. Im just not very happy that i feel i was misled on the auction

wigginsmum

He's bluffing - if he put in the auction description that it's compatible with XP then it's his fault and you're entitled to a refund. Try and sort it out by email and if he won't play ball, do a chargeback.

essexhoney

Thanks Wigginsmum, i will wait and see what the outcome of the email is, hopefully he is going to be co-operative *fingers crossed*

The only thing that i am worried about is the fact that it came sealed but we had to take the seal off to try it on the system, do you think that would effect the outcome in anyway?

If it comes to doing a chargeback i think i may have to come back for some more advice never had to do one before but im hoping it doesnt come to that.

wigginsmum

No I don't think it matters that you had to open it. You're not claiming it's faulty, just wrongly described ad incompatible with your system.

smartie1976

Don't let him try the "system compatibility is your responsibility" line on your. If he clearly said it works on ME/XP his listing in incorrect, and it is indeed his error.

Moglex

I don't actually think his T&C's are trying to get out of correctly refunding you in the current circumstances. If he says it's XP compatible and your system is XP, then you have fulfilled your obligcation to ensure that the item is compatible with your system.

He was probably quite unaware that the disk would not work with XP.

One would hope he'll refund without problems, but if he doesn't, you will be 100% in the right when requesting a chargeback.

matto

OP might have a problem as she has unsealed it before checking the compatibility on the case.

essexhoney

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=104752995071&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&rd=1

that is the item if anyone wanted to look at it, it does say on there about compatibility issues.

i have spoken to the bloke that built my pc and have shown him the listing and he has said if its not working on my system then it looks like it has been listed incorrectly.

Moglex

matto wrote:

OP might have a problem as she has unsealed it before checking the compatibility on the case.

I think that's the seller's problem, not the purchaser's.

Obviously programs released before XP could not state XP compatibility and yet the vast majority will work perfectly happily under XP.

So you expect the seller to provide information that the original manufacturer could not possible have forseen.

They did provide this information, and it was wrong so it's their problem. The fact that the seller could not ascertain that the sales information was incorrect without breaking the seal is unfortunate, but should not cause any difficulty unless the seller "tries it on".

Moglex

essexhoney wrote:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=104752995071&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&rd=1

that is the item if anyone wanted to look at it, it does say on there about compatibility issues.

i have spoken to the bloke that built my pc and have shown him the listing and he has said if its not working on my system then it looks like it has been listed incorrectly.

I've done a bit of digging, and apparantly it was originally claimed to be compatible with NT (which is what XP really is).

I'm quite surprised it doesn't work on XP as ms went to a great deal of trouble to ensure as much software as possible did, and this has always been a popular prog.

Can you get someone else with an XP machine to try and install it just to make sure that the problem does not lie with your machine?

Otherwise, you might return it only to have the supplier install it on an XP machine and reject (or charge you for) your return.

essexhoney

i have 3 pcs in the house all running on xp and they are all doing the same thing.

I have been through the help and support centre to try and make it compatible to windows it made my pc go really dodgy and looked like win 95 (looked so weird lmao) tried to install it and the message i got was
c:\winxp\system32\autoexec.nt. the system file is not suitable for running MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows applications. Choose close to terminate the application

apparently there is a patch for xp to fix that so im going to try that and hope that it works *fingers crossed*