Cold caller sold me advertising yesterday. Can I get out of it?

arcon5

Flyboy152 wrote: »

But, ultimately all contracts are subject to the same principles in law as any other. Penalties cannot be enforced by a vendor, they can only be imposed by a court and this sounds more like a penalty to me.

If you agree to pay £x for x months (totalling £y) and at the end of that period if you have to pay £y + £p (p = late payment fees for example) then £p would be the penalty. You could argue £y is a 'disguised penalty' but not so easy for B2B contracts.

Infact you are allowed to impose penalties on B2B contracts -- many companies do so (energy companies, suppliers ect).

The penalty would be enforced by the vendor through the courts. The 2 cases I mentioned are real cases so you cannot make a blanket argument that it's unlawful - it's not the suppliers imposed penalties, it's that they rejection the cancellation notice and continued making the service available!

Also, contracts formed after 7/8/02 can also add late payment charges + interest under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts Act (1998).. specifically:

£40 for debts upto £999.99
£70 upto £9999.99
£100 for higher amounts

arcon5

Flyboy152 wrote: »

But that would reveal the lies told by the salesman, wouldn't it?

I doubt they record the calls tbh, but that won't stop them playing the 'all calls are recorded' card.

However, an excellent point, it certainly would be incriminating against them -- they'd certainly look like a bunch of plonkers taking this to court as their evidence that a contract exists :rotfl:.

MothballsWallet

The mistakes in the grammar of the email that this company sent the OP seems dodgy as well.

poohbear59

MothballsWallet wrote: »

The mistakes in the grammar of the email that this company sent the OP seems dodgy as well.

They managed to get my business address wrong too. I am now feeling much more confident about calling back and saying it wasn't what I thought. If they say they recorded the converstaion then I will definitely say that I think we should all hear the conversation to prove what was promised.

I will now be very careful who I speak to on the phone. Being a new business owner I am on a steeper learning curve than I thought possible. None of my business set up and new business courses taught me anything like this.

Thank you all.
pooh

arcon5

poohbear59 wrote: »

They managed to get my business address wrong too. I am now feeling much more confident about calling back and saying it wasn't what I thought. If they say they recorded the converstaion then I will definitely say that I think we should all hear the conversation to prove what was promised.

I will now be very careful who I speak to on the phone. Being a new business owner I am on a steeper learning curve than I thought possible. None of my business set up and new business courses taught me anything like this.

Thank you all.
pooh

I assume you've had all the telescams from 'meter registrations' also claiming your meter is unregistered & they will disconnect your supple/your are on an emergency tariff/whatever rubbish they can think off when they are in fact brokers trying to earn a commission?

Then the persistent sales visits from fire extinguisher companies, promotional gift suppliers, the telecommunications companies (particularly XLN), the people that can get you onto page 1 of Google and all the other rubbish that comes with it!!

All this cr*p will eat into your day, and quickly. If they ask for you personally or the business owner respond with a quick 'they are not here, phone back another time' -- much quicker than explaining your not interested.

mo786uk

Flyboy152 wrote: »

But that would reveal the lies told by the salesman, wouldn't it?

Certain companies have been known to edit them to leave out certain info.

Flyboy152

mo786uk wrote: »

Certain companies have been known to edit them to leave out certain info.

But that wouldn't stand up to even basic forensic examination. I would suggest that, merely asking for the recording to independently analysed, would put off even the most dogged of scam artists.

mo786uk

Flyboy152 wrote: »

But that wouldn't stand up to even basic forensic examination. I would suggest that, merely asking for the recording to independently analysed, would put off even the most dogged of scam artists.

Of course, but how many people are going to do that for a smal lclaism court?

In the instance I knwo of what was happening was that acompany was claling people up, talking to them about a service. They woudl then later send them aninvoice and claim they had agreed to it on the phone last time. Obviously the customer woudl dispute this but the company would play back an edited recording. Often that was enough to make people pay up or fear court action.

Whether they would proceed to court is another matter - I never atcually heard the calls msyelf so couldnt comment on quality.

Flyboy152

mo786uk wrote: »

Of course, but how many people are going to do that for a smal lclaism court?

In the instance I knwo of what was happening was that acompany was claling people up, talking to them about a service. They woudl then later send them aninvoice and claim they had agreed to it on the phone last time. Obviously the customer woudl dispute this but the company would play back an edited recording. Often that was enough to make people pay up or fear court action.

Whether they would proceed to court is another matter - I never atcually heard the calls msyelf so couldnt comment on quality.

But an edited recording wouldn't match the telephone records, for example.

Just asking for an analysis would make them think twice. I would think it would cost about two or three hundred pounds, but if they wanted to submit an edited recording, they wouldn't get away with it and spend even more time in front of the beak. Having a criminal record for such things wouldn't do much for their future prospects, I wouldn't think.

poohbear59

I had a very long phone call with them this morning. It took a long time to get through to the customer service person that I am serious and do not want this magazine.

There was no mention of costs etc. but they did say that my message is being passed to the telesales person who called me and that I should not have been misled. They did of course spend ages promoting the magazine in the hope that they could make me change my mind.

Lets hope that is the last I hear from them.

ETA Because of all the information and guidance I was given on here I was much more confident and assertive and was able to fight my corner. I was very civil but firm in what I had to say.