Taking Red Letter Days to court....

Moglex

Another important point that the judge that tries this case will bear in mind is whether or not the company appears to have taken reasonable steps to ensure that any deadline is clear. For something that is very likely to be given as a present, placing T&C's on a website that is unlikely to be seen by the recipient and then printing the expiry date in small text on one of a number of pieces of paper in a box is unlikely to be satisfactory. I would expect that a judge would rule that for such a term to be enforceable the 'voucher' would have to be very clearly identifiable as such and have the expiry date printed in large, bold, type on the front in the same way as a season ticket or car tax disk does.

meer53

I think the OP is just peed off that they've not booked it and forgotten about the voucher. Surely in the last 20 months the person who bought them the voucher would have asked them how it was ? OP fail !!! In my opinion taking RLD to court is a bit of a joke.

Azari

meer53 wrote: »

I think the OP is just peed off that they've not booked it and forgotten about the voucher. Surely in the last 20 months the person who bought them the voucher would have asked them how it was ? OP fail !!! In my opinion taking RLD to court is a bit of a joke.

Well, according to the thread linked earlier, the last time someone threatened to take them to court they caved in so it would seem that they, presumably on the advice of their lawyers, are not quite so convinced of the joke as you.

rustyboy21

Can I just put something else into the mix, as I am interested in this thread, due to being given as gifts from suppliers RLD's in the past.

Azari..... I am not having a pop at anyone and see both sides , so hear me out......

Would the T&C's and the suggested invalidity of them , change if the RLD was given as a gift. Wouldn't it be similar to getting a Xmas present off someone and either wanting a refund or exchange. The SOGA does make your consumer rights different as you were not the person in Contractual agreement wth the supplier, so right to refund/use is different?

Most RLD's are bought as gifts, wouldn't they be classed as a 'voucher' to be redeemed for services? All vouchers have a expiry date on them, so what makes these different.

As said I am interested in response, as have had one expire and threw it away, I didn't lose money as it was a gift, only lost the experience.

JOHN1982

This all seems pretty clear (and unfair) to me.

RLD take money and keep hold of it.
They don't 'provide' anything (other than some paperwork).
If you don't use your voucher they never 'provide' anything.
They then keep your money.

If the argument is "our costs for that experience have gone up by x in the past y months" then offering to bridge that financial gap is surely right and they should accept it, or refund the original value.

Azari

rustyboy21 wrote: »

Can I just put something else into the mix, as I am interested in this thread, due to being given as gifts from suppliers RLD's in the past.

Azari..... I am not having a pop at anyone and see both sides , so hear me out......

Would the T&C's and the suggested invalidity of them , change if the RLD was given as a gift. Wouldn't it be similar to getting a Xmas present off someone and either wanting a refund or exchange. The SOGA does make your consumer rights different as you were not the person in Contractual agreement wth the supplier, so right to refund/use is different?

Most RLD's are bought as gifts, wouldn't they be classed as a 'voucher' to be redeemed for services? All vouchers have a expiry date on them, so what makes these different.

This is the whole point.

I'm pretty sure that a judge would ask a simple question:

1) Did the firm take reasonable steps to ensure that it was absolutely clear to someone who was presented with a voucher that it had an expiry date and what that date was. i.e. He or she will ask whether the company in question were doing what was necessary to ensure that their product could and would be used satisfactorily?

If they haven't, e.g. by not making the expiry date clearly visible on the front of something that is clearly 'the voucher' then he or she may well decide that any term relating to that date is unfair as it was either intended to catch out unwary purchasers or because the company were negligent in not taking sufficient precautions to ensure that purchasers were not unwittingly caught out.

Rather in the same way (to take a somewhat exaggerated case) as if you sell a ladder with "suitable for up to 16 stone" emblazoned on the front of the main packaging then a term limiting the weight of the user would be deemed 'fair', whereas if you buried the sentence: 'Only suitable for people weighing less than 10 stone", in very small type on page 10 of the instructions it would almost certainly be deemed unfair.

Jeff_Bridges_hair

JOHN1982 wrote: »

This all seems pretty clear (and unfair) to me.

RLD take money and keep hold of it.
They don't 'provide' anything (other than some paperwork).
If you don't use your voucher they never 'provide' anything.
They then keep your money.

If the argument is "our costs for that experience have gone up by x in the past y months" then offering to bridge that financial gap is surely right and they should accept it, or refund the original value.

I do believe RLDs vouchers are the same as 'gift vouchers' so you have paid them a sum of money to give someone else a 'gift'. They provide that person with information surrounding how to use their 'gift voucher' through the booking process and a date of expiry of the 'gift voucher'.

If you purchased a 'gift voucher' for a specific store or one of the ones that are readily available to use in any high street store and you dont us eit within a certain time then indeed that 'gift voucher' is then invalid and the company gets to keep your money also.

I dont see any reason why RLD 'gift vouchers' are nto treated in the same way as high street ones. I have an old HMV one from a few years back for £50 that cant be used now - and I dont expect them to honour it as it was not used out of my own stupidity - not theirs.

EDIT: Though this does appear to be something that should be tested in court to cliarify

Moglex

Jeff_Bridges_hair wrote: »

EDIT: Though this does appear to be something that should be tested in court to cliarify

I really believe that this will come down to how clear the expiry date was and if the judge feels that the company made all reasonable effort to ensure that the recipient (not necessarily the purchaser) was made fully aware of the that date.

A large, colourful, voucher, printed in intaglio with the expiry date in large, clear, type, would probably be seen as legitimate.

A date printed in a way that doesn't stand out on one piece amongst many others in a pack may well not be.

The judge will be asking if the expiry date is a reasonable commercial necessity that the company have diligently brought to the attention of the recipient or is it something that has clearly been set up to increase the companies profit margin by making it likely that the expiry date is not noticed or remembered by a proportion of recipients so that the company can keep the money without providing anything in return.

Chyna-s

texranger wrote: »

if the voucher had a clear expiry date and this was clearly mentioned in their tos then they have broke no laws and have not breached the unfair terms in consumer contracts regulations as a voucher was purchased with a clear expiry date that the purchased did not use the voucher before the expiry date, this has nothing to do with the vendor if the purchaser does not use the voucher in the allotted time. Any court would through this out.

Agree :t :t :t

Jeff_Bridges_hair

Moglex wrote: »

I really believe that this will come down to how clear the expiry date was and if the judge feels that the company made all reasonable effort to ensure that the recipient (not necessarily the purchaser) was made fully aware of the that date.

A large, colourful, voucher, printed in intaglio with the expiry date in large, clear, type, would probably be seen as legitimate.

A date printed in a way that doesn't stand out on one piece amongst many others in a pack may well not be.

The judge will be asking if the expiry date is a reasonable commercial necessity that the company have diligently brought to the attention of the recipient or is it something that has clearly been set up to increase the companies profit margin by making it likely that the expiry date is not noticed or remembered by a proportion of recipients so that the company can keep the money without providing anything in return.

Indeed.

But I find it hard to believe that the company would, as the OP claims, put it on a small bit of card in amongst a big box of papers.

Ive never had one so wouldnt know but would be interesting to find out.