Discount withdrawn - after confirmation email and payment

christane

Hello,
not sure this is the right thread, but anyway:

I bought some shoes from the manufacture's website the other day. To my surprise I was offered a 50 % discount. Great! I ordered, paid and received the confirmation email. Money was taken from my account accordingly.
Next day i received a mail that the order had been cancelled, "due to technical problems the order could no be processed". Which is obviously not true as confirmation email and money taken out of my account shows.

It becomes obvious that the website had played up and I should not have been offered the discount. Now they are trying to get out of this by stating technical problems and just cancelling the order (and reimbursing, which has not happened yet).

Contact with them I found rude and short and now they have stopped answering my emails.

In my view a legally binding contract/sale has been established with completed order, money transfer, confirmation email.

According to their website's conditions the only stated reason for cancelling an order after the aforementioned procedures is lack of stock. This though, as confirmed in three different response emails, was not why they cancelled. They kept referring to technical problems.

Any opinions?
Thanks very much for reading,
Chris

tomwakefield

Sorry, the shop is within its rights to specify when your offer is accepted, and this is usually upon dispatch. Save your time and move on, you've probably not got a leg to stand on.

What is the shop?

christane

Hi Tom,
thanks for your reply.

It's Grenson shoes.

I thought similar to you but after reading this I was not so sure (from Which?, consumer rights, cant post link:

After your order has been accepted

If your offer has been accepted (for example, you pay a deposit, or receive a confirmation email), generally you can insist that the retailer sells you the goods for the price they were advertised at.
If the retailer wants to charge you more, you may be able to buy the same item elsewhere and claim against the original trader for the difference in price. To do this you should write to the retailer in the first instance, explaining what you are doing. If it doesn't agree to refund you the money, you will normally then have to take a claim to the small claims court.
The trader could try to argue that it made a mistake with the pricing which could make the contract void. But it would have to show that the price was so low that you must have known it was not genuine: for example, a new leather jacket with a price tag of £2 on it.


Chris

bod1467

Distance selling is different though. What Tom posted is correct. Time to move on.

unholyangel

It depends when their T&C's say contract is formed.

If it is upon payment, you could technically try and enforce that they supply at the price paid.

If it is upon delivery then, as above, you dont have a leg to stand on.

somethingcorporate

Very unlikely that their T&Cs don't have this sewn up, most retailers nowadays do.

Move on.

tomwakefield

I think http://www.grenson.co.uk/terms is the site

Interestingly, I can't see anywhere which states when the contract is formed. Anyone know when the "default" acceptance would be considered to be?

unholyangel

tomwakefield wrote: »

I think http://www.grenson.co.uk/terms is the site

Interestingly, I can't see anywhere which states when the contract is formed. Anyone know when the "default" acceptance would be considered to be?

I had a look and couldnt see it either, thought I was maybe just overlooking it

All I can find on it is:
A contract would be formed once a customer makes an offer by placing an order and the supplier accepts this offer.

The terms and conditions about when the contract is formed should be clear - for example when the supplier sends back a confirmation email. This will help to avoid situations where you are unable to meet the customer's expectations for any reason, if commercial circumstances change.

However, automatically generated confirmations of orders can potentially cause confusion about when the contract is formed. So you should ensure that you word them in such a way that they are not legally an acceptance of a customer's offer.



Guess its down to the wording of the confirmation email. OP?

dshart

One thing I am not clear about in your original post is what price the shoes were advertised at? Were they advertised at full price and at checkout the 50% discount appeared? The reason I ask is that you say you were surprised you were offered a 50% discount. Even in your quote from Which Consumer Rights there is a get out clause where it says if the price was so low that you must have known it was not genuine, and saying you were surprised at the discount may come under this category.

bod1467

In law - if the T&Cs are ambiguous (or no specific statement is made) then they fall in favour of the party who stands to lose out. In this case the consumer would lose out so the contract may be formed on payment.

What does the confirmation email state?

christane

Hi,
thanks for all your replies.

I was surprised at the discount, but certainly did not think at the time that this must be an error.
The shoes were 220 pounds, the discount was 110 pounds.

I think the which quote relates to distant selling as it mentions a confirmation email.

That confirmation email does not mention any more in terms of further terms and conditions.

Chris