Internet/telepone purchasing... and our rights

jakrach

My daughter purchased a basic scuba diving course off Groupon and paid Groupon £99 on Debit card. The voucher was emailed and she then rang the company offering the course as they advertised upgrades to a full open water dive course for £100. She paid £100 to the Company (BLUE) on Debit card.

No receipt of payment was received and no promised dates were sent. After several phone calls in between lectures (She's a student). I rang Groupon and cancelled the booking. Groupon refunded the money immediately, but BLUE have taken the £100 and now refuse to return it. I have emailed them quoting Supply of goods & Service Act 1982 and Distance Selling Regulations but to no avail, they say
"An internet order is done when placed through our website, however we do not sell coureses through our website and the order was placed over the phone.I took the payment to upgrade, and as I explained at the time Blue does not refund. We are still happy to do the course."



First of all is this covered under the 7-day cooling off period.
How can they take the money for the Upgrade, when the original booking has been cancelled?
What is to stop them from now taking the £99 which Groupon have refunded? They are obviously an uscrupulous company that totally ignores consumer rights... so where do we go from here – small claims?

Thanks
Jackie

unholyangel

I have a feeling this would be covered by:

2) Regulations 7 to 19(1) shall not apply to—

(b)contracts for the provision of accommodation, transport, catering or leisure services, where the supplier undertakes, when the contract is concluded, to provide these services on a specific date or within a specific period.

Problem is, regulation 10 is your right to cancel.

wealdroam

jakrach wrote: »

How can they take the money for the Upgrade, when the original booking has been cancelled?

Err... you cancelled the original booking after paying for the upgrade.
Does that leave you with an unusable upgrade? I don't know, but I cannot see how that is any fault of BLUE.

jakrach wrote: »

They are obviously an uscrupulous company that totally ignores consumer rights...

I am not sure how you arrived at that conclusion.
They say that they stated the course was not cancellable at the time of booking.
Did they do that? Not that it matters too much, except that your daughter would've been fully aware of the situation.

jakrach wrote: »

...so where do we go from here – small claims?

How about trying to re-instate the course previously booked with Groupon?