comet- money taken before checking stock

eskimo26

Wondering if this legal? They took £650 pounds today at the store THEN said the item is not in stock, they refused to give the money back on the pretense that the item won't be sent to them as stock if they did so.

Manager was unapologetic and cited 'human error' and unabashedly informed us 'it happens.' They gave us a £20 voucher and now we have the inconvenience of returning there tomorrow having been assured it will arrive by then (it's not local).

They have been told because of the abysmal way it was handled complaints will be made regardless of the voucher, this was made clear when they gave it to us.

But i'm wondering aside from poor customer service if their wasn't some legal implications on the consumer rights side of things?

mo786uk

Well tis illegal to:

5. Making an invitation to purchase products at a specified price without disclosing the existence of any reasonable grounds the trader may have for believing that he will not be able to offer for supply, or to procure another trader to supply, those products or equivalent products at that price for a period that is, and in quantities that are, reasonable having regard to the product, the scale of advertising of the product and the price offered (bait advertising).

Though that may not be what happened here, technically.

eskimo26

What happened in a nutshell was that we payed £650, got the transaction processed, got a reciept and then we were told their is no product in store come back tomorrow, if we refund you they won't send the product so we are not giving you your money back.

It seems legally dubious to me, but whether it was bait advertising is doubtful given the company. (i think?)

mo786uk

I woudl argue that they gave the impressio nthat the item would be there to take away that day so it was maybe implied mirepresentation and theyshould have allowed you to cancel the contract

it seems odd that they wouldnt refund you.

eskimo26

mo786uk wrote: »

I woudl argue that they gave the impressio nthat the item would be there to take away that day so it was maybe implied mirepresentation and they should have allowed you to cancel the contract

it seems odd that they wouldnt refund you.

I wasn't there it was my sister but she has a good business head on her shoulders. She said she pushed for it and was told they wouldn't get the stock sent to them if the money was refunded. Its also in a pretty dodgy area that not exactly well known for its quality of customer service [Croydon]. She read them the riot act hence the voucher, in her line of work you take no prisoners, so she is not a shrinking violet and wouldn't have let it go easily.

My worry at this point is what good is a reciept for refunds if you have no physical item, what's to stop them saying we have the product?

Today was a saturday and tomorrow is a sunday, so i'm not convinced they will be able to get the product delivered and in stock, and my Sister is not one to stand failure. She can and will strip flesh with her tongue and she already gave them a serious tongue lashing today so tomorrow will be worse. I'm in two minds whether to go, if they refuse a refund again can we contact the police non-emergency? Its basically theft, no?
:eek:

N9eav

The Police won't come as it's a civil matter.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1979/54

It seems by looking at the act that at the very least you have been promised goods today. If they break that agreement, you should have the right to your money back for non-delivery.

roddydogs

Why did you not do "Check and reserve" online, and you dont pay till you pick up the goods either. And why is Croydon a "Dodgy Area" for customer service? do you mean Comet only?.

withabix

roddydogs wrote: »

Why did you not do "Check and reserve" online,

If there are less than 3 of an item in stock at a Comet store, it won't show as being available to reserve anyway iirc.

eskimo26

roddydogs wrote: »

Why did you not do "Check and reserve" online, and you dont pay till you pick up the goods either. And why is Croydon a "Dodgy Area" for customer service? do you mean Comet only?.

Sorry but its full of inner city chavs who are socially inempt and have no idea how to deal with a customer without being rude and/or aggressive. We go their a lot, great for shopping but the people are really rough.

pc world- my sister had her broken laptop upgraded and exchanged for a new one after a sales assistant gave her attitude. (God knows what he did for the manager to give her a £300 upgrade!)

both tkmaxxs- Filthy and look like pound shops compared to their branches in sutton and epsom, the staff here are terrible and they are regularly accusing their customers of theft in order to get out of selling products there own staff have mislabelled. (They accuse you of peeling off and using a label from another garment! Has happened to us loads even when the label looks new and not old, torn or tatty they still have the cheek to do it.)

House of reeves- sales assistant claimed that getting a mattress in medium cost more in price then medium-firm. He even rang the supplier to check and charged me extra, not sure to this day if it was genuine.

t-mobile- was sold a contract on the pretense i would receive £25 pound vouchers through the recommend a friend scheme, voucher never materialised and when i asked the other day their manager rang them and it seems they were happy enough to put it on to the system to get my bussiness but not pay it out because i was 'on solo' or some garbage like that. So their staff hadn't realised in their rush to sign me up and they hadn't bother contacting me to tell me.

croydon council- argh don't get me started, nasty, nasty, nasty. We foster for them, they must be one of the most incompetent councils in england. They are also sacking their social workers without notice, we have been told by their social workers of colleagues turning up for work and not having their access cards work then being told by security that their card has been disabled, they no longer work there and they escorted out. I would find it hard to believe anywhere else but in Croydon anything is possible, very dodgy.

Oh and my Mum had horrific food poisoning recently after we ate at one of the restaurants.

Also the people on the street in west croydon openly selling fenced goods its a disgrace.

duchy

LOL

I was reading this thread thinking-sounds odd but Comet aren't the best retailer so maybe there's some truth in in............ then got to the bit about who it must be because "Croydon is a dodgy area" .

What ? All of it? The Purley Way ? Just the Whitgift centre ? Must admit I can name a few shopping areas I'd consider dodgy but Croydon certainly isn't on the list. Have you actually been there to shop ???

Thanks for the laugh though but you blew any credibility in your tale with that.

Ahhh you're from over the border -got it-Roundshaw or St Helier ?. Funny you choose to go into shops you think are dirty, you get accused of dodgy dealing in these shops,you shop in West Croydon-what on earth for if you are looking for your cheap chain stores? Your geography is about as good as your punctuation and spelling if you think Croydon is inner-city and you compare it unfavourably with Sutton ???? That'll be the Sutton where I used to walk down the high street every Monday morning and always see at least one shop window broken by drunks -Croydon which is vastly bigger you'd see it once in a blue moon.

Actually you're very funny -TKMaxx, Poundshop etc aren't high end stores and Comet are notorious for poor customer service-no-one buys there except on price-Croydon has some excellent stores -and the Whitgift centre is safe and reliable -Sutton has always been the poor relation -the St Nicholas Centre has always struggled-had empty units and a big shop lifting problem. (Unlike you I have never been accused of tag switching-does it really happen to you a lot ?) As for buying a bed-you get offered a price-you say Yes I want it-or No I don't-Reeves didn't force you to buy it LOL

Not sure quite what Croydon Social services has to do with shopping but for what it's worth I've worked there on short term assignments and seen the quality of social-workers -it was mixed to say the least-also some I came across were literally temps -on rolling contracts -so when a contract ends I'd really hope their access was stopped. I think you've told half the story there but it's not important as it has nothing to do with shopping anyway.

I grew up near to Croydon, have lived in Sutton and worked in Epsom as well as Croydon -of the three areas I get better choice and better atmosphere shopping in Croydon, Not saying Croydon is perfect -it's far bigger than the other two shopping areas you mentioned and has far fewer problems but then we are all entitled to our opinions and are free to shop where we like-which is why I'm a bit bemused that you and your family keep returning to shop in Croydon with other alternatives so close by.

It's a bit rich you think Croydon is peopled by the socially inept-when YOU want to call the police for a civil matter and want to make accusations of theft.

It's really very simple your sister either doesn't have the business head you think she does -or wanted the item enough to wait for it. There's no reason she couldn't have got a refund-and a call to customer services would have sorted that-although had the transaction gone through and it was on a card...then she wouldn't have got the refund until possibly the next business day. However although I try and avoid Comet I've mystery shopped them a couple of times and my recollection is that items are scanned to go through the till so how did they scan it with no product present ? Sorry something just isn't adding up-but as you say you weren't there so may have misunderstood the situation (which makes your rant even funnier)

Hintza

eskimo26 wrote: »

Sorry but its full of inner city chavs who are socially inempt and have no idea how to deal with a customer without being rude and/or aggressive. We go their a lot, great for shopping but the people are really rough.

pc world- my sister had her broken laptop upgraded and exchanged for a new one after a sales assistant gave her attitude. (God knows what he did for the manager to give her a £300 upgrade!)

both tkmaxxs- Filthy and look like pound shops compared to their branches in sutton and epsom, the staff here are terrible and they are regularly accusing their customers of theft in order to get out of selling products there own staff have mislabelled. (They accuse you of peeling off and using a label from another garment! Has happened to us loads even when the label looks new and not old, torn or tatty they still have the cheek to do it.)

House of reeves- sales assistant claimed that getting a mattress in medium cost more in price then medium-firm. He even rang the supplier to check and charged me extra, not sure to this day if it was genuine.

t-mobile- was sold a contract on the pretense i would receive £25 pound vouchers through the recommend a friend scheme, voucher never materialised and when i asked the other day their manager rang them and it seems they were happy enough to put it on to the system to get my bussiness but not pay it out because i was 'on solo' or some garbage like that. So their staff hadn't realised in their rush to sign me up and they hadn't bother contacting me to tell me.

croydon council- argh don't get me started, nasty, nasty, nasty. We foster for them, they must be one of the most incompetent councils in england. They are also sacking their social workers without notice, we have been told by their social workers of colleagues turning up for work and not having their access cards work then being told by security that their card has been disabled, they no longer work there and they escorted out. I would find it hard to believe anywhere else but in Croydon anything is possible, very dodgy.

Oh and my Mum had horrific food poisoning recently after we ate at one of the restaurants.

Also the people on the street in west croydon openly selling fenced goods its a disgrace.

Sounds as if you are a masochist or do you treat it as a bit of a walk on the wild side to fill a Saturday afernoon?

(This OPs's post needs saved for posterity)