Refusal of refund after false advertising?

Bufger

On Monday i ordered a pair of headphones from an online company via a google shop search. The sole reason i chose this particular company is because it was the only one that didnt say 'out of stock'.

yesterday this company took the monies for the item in full. A short time later i recieved an email notification saying that the item is on back order. I then emailed the customer service team to enquire as to what exactly 'back order' meant and went on to say that if it meant the item is not in stock then i think their website was misleading and I would like a refund.

They eventually replied saying that although it clearly says 'AVAILABLE' in green writing next to the items picture it is infact out of stock as is detailed in plain text at the bottom of the page (mixed in with lots of other product information text). Here is that in a direct quote:

The item you ordered does clearly state estimated delivery 1st Feb 2010. Therefore as we are accepting pre-orders the stock status is displayed as "Available"

The item on the website (so you can see for yourself): https://secure.airetechit.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=96_181&products_id=4221&zenid=bjihimi6kt8rjttaqft3rgrl24

Here is a link to the conditions of use the customer service rep has sent me: https://secure.airetechit.co.uk/index.php?main_page=conditions&zenid=sc9s3d7d3njefiof0rp5s0ki13

They have said that i can cancel my order but will incur a cancellation fee. I find this completely unacceptable! The only reason i purchased from this company is because i was lead to believe they had them in stock when nobody else did. I am paying more than i would in some online stores just for this fact!

Is there anything i can do to get my money back without incurring a fee? this seems downright wrong to me. Any help/advice is more than welcome

-Bufger

aliasojo

I'm not knowledgeable enough to help you with the legalities of your query but I want to thank you for posting. This company will be on my list of 'ones to avoid' now.

I think asking for a cancellation fee when they can't even supply the item is ridiculous tbh.

One thing I would say, is that personally, the 'phone for realtime stock levels' message would have flagged up a warning for me that the 'available' part didn't necessarily mean they had stock. I also think the pre-order part was visible enough and it's not their fault you didn't clearly read.

Somewhat misleading at first glance though, I agree.

pitkin2020

LOL there is only 4 lines of text for the product, the 4th line being "pre-order now, expected delivery date 1st Feb 2010", sorry but it looks very clear to me. I think you knew what you were looking for, searched and found this site, saw available and never looked at the rest of the page, just clicked buy.
I dont think it is right though that they take a fee for cancelling an order they can not fulfil now.

Bufger

pitkin2020 wrote: »

LOL there is only 4 lines of text for the product, the 4th line being "pre-order now, expected delivery date 1st Feb 2010", sorry but it looks very clear to me. I think you knew what you were looking for, searched and found this site, saw available and never looked at the rest of the page, just clicked buy.
I dont think it is right though that they take a fee for cancelling an order they can not fulfil now.

I'm not disputing the fact that i missed that at the end (if it was even there first time round) but surely there is a reason why every other store on the net clearly identifies when something is out of stock and never put 'Available' as the eye catching statement.

I had been trawling through 20+ websites before that checking the stock of each, i had already read the product description on one of the first websites and had read many user reviews. As the first 2 lines of text were the same as all of the others i didnt feel the need to look any further (my error in hindsight). Still i think they are in the wrong here by not giving me a refund when they dont have the item to sell in the first place.

4743hudsonj

To be honest its quite clear, your in the wrong about that. But luckily for you, you have basic rights to a refund anyways as underlay has posted. This is under the distance selling regs and its illegal for the site to charge a cancellation fee.

AireTechIT

Hi all,

I would firstly like to thank you all for bringing these errors with our website to my attention, initially when the email was sent to "Bufger", I was not aware of these problems.

The pre-order statements have now been moved to underneath the product title and hopefully made clearer. The main reason we state products as "Available" is the product is available to order, when we are no longer able to supply a product, it is removed from our website. Whilst this in a very small number of cases does cause confusion, we ask all customers to phone or talk to us via the Live Chat on our website to get live stock levels. We are in the process of implementing live stock levels on our website.

In regards to the issues pointed out with our Terms and Conditions, I have passed these onto our solicitors for some amendments to be made.

I shall be reviewing Bufgers' case and contacting him directly within the next couple days.

Best Regards,
David Catherall,
Group Sales Manager,
AireTech IT.

Bufger

Issue now solved.

Thanks to everyone from MSE that replied and helped towards this fast conclusion and thankyou AireTech for seeing some sense in the end. All companies have to grow and change so see this as a form of feedback that incurred you no charge except the loss of one customer.

I bought the same product from another source 10 minutes after this resolve had been verbally agreed - £10 cheaper and in stock.

Everyones happy :-)

BigJohn1

In a similar situation to yourself Bufger, I was looking for an item that was out of stock on all other sites. I found Airetechit and it said "Available". Now I hadn't heard of the site before so did a quick google and found this forum entry. Thought "probably okay" as seemed you had failed to read some small print. So decided to be on safe side and call to see if they were actually in stock. Each time I called I got an answering machine so decided instead to email them the question as to stock levels. Around 7 hours later I got a polite response saying they were in stock and would be delivered within 3 days if order was placed before 4pm following day. I went on website and saw that the price had been increased from £107 to £118. Because I wanted to order 6 of this:
www airetechit co uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=533_563&products_id=21057
it is an extra £60. You will see from the product description that this item is computer memory and quite niche so very unlikely to suddenly change in price. It could be coincidence, I'll let you decide. One thing I will note is how easy it was for them to manipulate the website. Made me think "maybe the website was modified after Bufger had ordered..."?

To give benefit of the doubt, maybe the product was genuinely mispriced and once I enquired they realised (though the price was inline with other sites as can be seen here:
www google co uk/products/catalog?hl=en&q=KVR1066D3N7/4G&cid=4581117690220522880&scoring=p&os=sellers
)? Would have been nice if they would have explained in their email if that was the case. I have decided not to purchase the product from them as I see price changes after enquiry as extremely underhand.

because I am a new forum member I have not been able to post weblinks so have had to remove fullstops from root of webaddresses above.

BigJohn1

Received an email today (I emailed them yesterday letting them know I wouldn't be going ahead with order as explained above):


Hi John,

Unfortunately prices change on a regular basis as most of our stock is brought in direct from the manufacturers in the USA.

Best Regards,
...






Maybe I am missing something but on that basis I would consider the item - NOT available. Not available at the price initially advertised.

Bufger

Hi John, sorry i wasnt around to answer your original post.

I get the impression that Airetech IT is a company ran by one person from his home trying to act like a larger company with a 'legal team' and 'website team' being all the same one person. I may be wrong of course but the whole thing keeps screaming 'STAY AWAY' to me. i still recieve their email offers on a weekly basis and the emails are very informal, often with spelling mistakes which only confirms my suspicion.

Perhaps trading standards are worth a call.

I'm glad im not the only one in anycase. Im also glad you chose to google the company before dealing with them, im glad my post helped you to avoid a painful process!

AireTechIT

BigJohn1 wrote: »

In a similar situation to yourself Bufger, I was looking for an item that was out of stock on all other sites. I found Airetechit and it said "Available". Now I hadn't heard of the site before so did a quick google and found this forum entry. Thought "probably okay" as seemed you had failed to read some small print. So decided to be on safe side and call to see if they were actually in stock. Each time I called I got an answering machine so decided instead to email them the question as to stock levels. Around 7 hours later I got a polite response saying they were in stock and would be delivered within 3 days if order was placed before 4pm following day. I went on website and saw that the price had been increased from £107 to £118. Because I wanted to order 6 of this:
www airetechit co uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=533_563&products_id=21057
it is an extra £60. You will see from the product description that this item is computer memory and quite niche so very unlikely to suddenly change in price. It could be coincidence, I'll let you decide. One thing I will note is how easy it was for them to manipulate the website. Made me think "maybe the website was modified after Bufger had ordered..."?

To give benefit of the doubt, maybe the product was genuinely mispriced and once I enquired they realised (though the price was inline with other sites as can be seen here:
www google co uk/products/catalog?hl=en&q=KVR1066D3N7/4G&cid=4581117690220522880&scoring=p&os=sellers
)? Would have been nice if they would have explained in their email if that was the case. I have decided not to purchase the product from them as I see price changes after enquiry as extremely underhand.

because I am a new forum member I have not been able to post weblinks so have had to remove fullstops from root of webaddresses above.

Hi,

I am sorry to hear you were not happy with the service you received from AireTech IT. Unfortunately memory prices are constantly rising all the time due to a number of factors: currency rates, manufacturer price rises etc. I do however agree that this should have been communicated in the email response to yourself.

Best Regards,
David Catherall,
Group Sales Manager,
AireTech IT.