7 days to cancel

morgan2101

Hello all,

This is my first post, so please be gentle.

We (the other half and I) saw in our local paper that there were grants available for the instalation of double glazing uPVC doors. This was of interest as we need a new door so we phoned the number and a man arranged a date and time to come round and show us what was what and to give us the all important quote.

The day arrived and the man turned up looking like he knew his stuff and showed us the brochures and gave us the bumf about his doors being the best which I expected of course. He said that the standard price for a door would be £1350 at which I nearly swore at him. He then went on to explain that if we agreed to go ahead then he had to make a call to his boss to organise the "grant", this was done and the price plummeted to £600 cash.

The long and short of it is The Mrs signed a piece of paper to agree to the surveyor coming round to measure the door more accurately
and to take our final choice for the design of the door. (I was in the other room seeing the screaming kids).

The man left and we began to think about getting other quotes so we called the chap back to say that we were going to get some other quotes and could we leave it for a bit and we would get back to him. He got a bit shirty saying that we had signed a contract and that the grant money would go to waste if we didnt take it as the scheme finished at the end of teh week. I said that we would like to cancel our agreement, which it says on the back we can do within 7 days, he said fine and hung the phone up.

I e-mailed a couple of days later (what with the bank holidays and that I thought a letter may get delayed) thus leaving two of our even days remaining as I thought it would do no harm to get a couple of quotes to compare.

We received a call this morning from the "Sales Director" of this company saying that we had not cancelledin time as he only received the e-mail yesterday which would be 8 days after he visited.

Basically, my question is what should we do now? We don't want the door from them as we don't trust them.

When a contract says "within 7 days" does it automatically mean "business days" or not, cos if it does we are sorted, if not, then...

I can't prove when I sent the e-mail either cos my computer automatically cleanses itself every couple of days and stuff like that goes down the plughole.

PS: as you may well have realised the grants the chap was talking about were pure fiction.

Hope someone can offer assistance.

Steve.

Doozergirl

Have you paid them anything? Is there any kind of credit agreement involved?

Clive_Woody

Give Consumer Direct a call, they will be able to advise

http://www.oft.gov.uk/consumer-advice/oft-and-cd/

morgan2101

Doozergirl wrote: »

Have you paid them anything? Is there any kind of credit agreement involved?

Nope, luckily. Not paid them anything and no credit agreement was entered.

Doozergirl

morgan2101 wrote: »

Nope, luckily. Not paid them anything and no credit agreement was entered.

It doesn't even sound like you've placed a proper order if they haven't measured properly and you haven't picked a door.

Do call Consumer Direct by all means, they should reassure you.


There is no firm order, they can't have started producing the door for you without measurements or specification and you will have clear evidence in the form of the sent email that you cancelled within seven days anyway and the law clearly gives you 7 days to do so. It would never go as far as County Court but as soon as you produced the email, the judge would laugh them out.

They are just bullying you. I wouldn't take any more calls from them, if they call, ask them to put any correspondence into writing and put the phone down.

ic

From adviceguide.org.uk

Doorstep selling is when you buy something from someone face-to-face but away from trade premises – for example, at home or from a salesperson at your workplace. If you buy something from a doorstep sale, as well as the usual rights you have when you buy from a shop, you also have the right to a seven-day 'cooling off' period. To have this right, the goods you buy must cost over £35. It does not matter whether or not you invited the sales person to call at your home or workplace.

...

The cooling off period gives you seven days in which you can change your mind and cancel your order, without having to pay anything.

The sales person must tell you that you have this right, in writing, when you place your order. If they don't, you can cancel your order at any time and get your money back – even if this is after seven days. If a trader doesn't tell you about your right to cancel an order made in a doorstep sale, you should complain to Consumer Direct

...

Even if you don't have the right to cancel your order, or want to cancel after seven days, the trader may still agree to cancel it. However, they would be entitled to charge a cancellation fee, or to keep your deposit.

I'd read seven days as seven real days - not working/business days. However it depends what the contract you have signed says - if it says in writing, you might have an argument on your hands.

My grandparents signed up for double glazing from Everest. The seventh day was Christmas eve, and they showed me the order on that day. The office was miles away and had closed the previous day from Christmas. My grandparents weren't aware of the cooling off period - it was written in tiny light grey text that they just couldn't see on the order. I pushed hard with the manager straight after Christmas and in the end he relented said "he didn't need our order anyway" and refunded the deposit my Grandad had already paid - £10,000.

Mojisola

There are no grants available for replacing doors. They lied to you. That's not going to look good for them if they try to take it further.

keystone

The seven days is timed from when you sent it not when he read it. If it was by email its deemed to have been sent and delivered by the end of the next day following you sending it. If he applied that logic universally then he could leave all cancellation letters sitting in his in-tray until 8 days have passed then read them and reject them. He's having a laugh. Tell 'em to swivel.

The key part of what ic quoted is this:

The sales person must tell you that you have this right, in writing, when you place your order. If they don't, you can cancel your order at any time and get your money back – even if this is after seven days.

So if he didn;t give you a "right to cancel" notice when he was with you they have broken the law. So still tell 'em to swivel.

Cheers

sashman

I thought the cooling off period had changed to 14 days, (that may be a new proposal) either way a decent company wont want to get a bad reputation, however they dont seem to be a good company if they offer grants for DG.....sounds like a "close" to me.

besides if they haven't surveyed it they haven't incurred any costs other than paying the sales man his commission

sashman