Mobile phone contract

yummy-mummy-77

Hi everyone,

My 17 year old niece and her boyfriend were duped into signing a mobile phone contract, they were only asked for bank statements and nothing else, no ID or any other means of verification. ( I know, alarm bells would have rung for me too) , anyway they both signed for an iphone 5, all inclusive mins, texts and data, for £15 a month, yes I know I'm laughing too, anyway the people from the shop rang them both yesterday and told them the phones had to be returned and that they were owed the value of the phones and that £98 would be deducted by DD tomorrow, at which point mother is now involved the stores customer care team are flapping, the fraud team are investigating and it's all gone a bit mental. The phone's were fake the contracts should never have been signed I could go on. My question is, do the kids have any legal standing as they are now both without phones that they signed up for in good faith even though they now know the contracts aren't worth the paper they're written on. Any help massively appreciated, thanks in advance.

tyllwyd

Can you explain a bit more? Did they go into a (genuine) shop and sign up for a phone each but without showing ID? They were allowed to take the phones home but now the shop realises they were under 17 and want the phones back? Is that right? Who is being investigated for fraud - the two teenagers or the salesman or someone else? Did a genuine shop supply fake phones? If the shop want to cancel the contract, where does the direct debit of £98 come into the picture?

yummy-mummy-77

sorry, they weren't asked for proof of age it was never questioned, they haven't lied to get the phone's they were mis-sold them by a genuine store, then they both got told to take them back to the shop as they weren't genuine handsets, nothing to do with them only being 17, the store's CC team have started their own investigation into the store from what i'm aware and have told the parents to cancel the DD's from their end, as no one is able to say what the £98 is for. The kids also part exed their old handsets toward the cost of the new ones and there has been no mention of those being replaced. is this a little bit clearer?

federer

what makes you think the new handsets were fake

tyllwyd

That does make more sense.

To be honest, since this is a big company, I would have thought their best bet is to go to the company and ask them what they are willing to offer to compensate them. If there has been dodgy stuff going on, you would hope they would be embarrassed into offering something.

But if this is an ongoing matter, it's probably been reported to the police - you are probably best deleting this thread in case it causes any problems.

Silk

I'm wondering if it's the part ex phones that are fake and they want £98 being the part ex value ???

yummy-mummy-77

I've edited details out, so that shouldn't cause problems, and the staff from the shop told them the phone's weren't legitimate.

yummy-mummy-77

no it was the new one's that weren't legitimate.

Silk

yummy-mummy-77 wrote: »

no it was the new one's that weren't legitimate.

Well if that were true I would be holding on to the new phones as the kids would be on to a well paid story for Phones4u selling fake phones

yummy-mummy-77

The store made them take them back and haven't returned the part exed ones. they also made them pay £4 for each charger and bought accessories, all of which have been kept by the shop.