After how long after delivery do extra items become mine?

zzzLazyDaisy

You made a phone call when this first happened and spoke to someone. So I'd suggest that you phone them again instead of e-mailing.

The legal situation is that these are NOT unsolicited goods - you did order them, but were sent two lots by mistake. This does not come under the Unsolicited Goods Act. This means you must either return them or pay for them. After 6 years the seller cannot take you to court over this, but does still own the clothes and can still contact you or come knocking on your door. Adnittedly that is probably not very likely, but the point id the clothes never become yours, and you have a duty to take reasonable care of them while they remain in your possession.

If you do not wish to phone them and sort this out, you could write to the company at the address for service given on the website (not by e-mail) explaining the situation and giving them a reasonable amount of time to contact you to make arrangements to collect the goods, failing which you will dispose of them. I suggest you give them at least 6 weeks to get back to you as the correspondence address is often not the main office address and correspondence can take some time to reach the correct person. Send the letter by recorded delivery so you can check on-line that it has in fact been delivered. Make sure you keep a copy of your letter, and attach a printout of the signature to your copy in case of any future come-back.

Alternatively, just store the clothes for at least 6 years.

fat-pudding

unholyangel wrote: »

An answer to what?

You thought the statute of limitations only applies to debt you currently owe. It doesnt. Its also how long they have to bring actions against you for breach of care/statutory duty.

I want an answer over my next steps to take given the situation above, it's quite simple, a mistake has been made, I've informed the vendor of their mistakes and they have not responded to arrange to collect the items which were technically unsolicited as they cancelled the order before it was formed therefore no contract exists...

Can someone point me at which specific bit of statute or law handles this situation so that I can work out if there is any liability to me given the lack of performance on behalf of the other party. OK, the limit for civil action is 6 years, but which bit of statute would they potentially take me to court under (which they wouldn't as it would cost them more than the value of the clothes).

fat-pudding

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

The legal situation is that these are NOT unsolicited goods - you did order them, but were sent two lots by mistake.

I'm not phoning again at my cost and another 20 minutes on hold to spend 10 minutes discussing on the phone that I have to return them (despite the company having a pickup process you have to pay for in advance) the world doesn't work like that.

Anyhow, to be *very* clear I did *not* order them, I attempted to place an order that was then listed as failed or incomplete, so they did not form a contract, I then tried to do this *again* and the same thing happened. The only order I did place where a contract was formed was the *last* one, that was the one they actually cancelled...

They sent 2 lots of items from 2 orders both of which they cancelled before forming the only way they took payment was they cancelled after paypal gave authorisation.

Anyhow, given that the only answer seems to be store the clothes for 6 years or waste my time going back to the vendor I'm taking the third path. I'll store them for 6 months then take them to the charity shop, if anyone asks after that period of time I'll just say they were returned at the time and thought it had been dealt with. Legally might be dubious, chances of anything coming out of it, very low.

zzzLazyDaisy

fat-pudding wrote: »

Can someone point me at which specific bit of statute or law handles this situation so that I can work out if there is any liability to me given the lack of performance on behalf of the other party.

It is simple contract law. You ordered the clothes, they performed the contract. In doing so, they mistakenly performed it twice. The law is very clear on 'mistake' - the clothes still belong to the seller.

iammumtoone

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

The law is very clear on 'mistake' - the clothes still belong to the seller.

That is understandable but I feel for the OP, what is she suppose to do? She has told the company three times and they are not responding surely it can't be her responsibility and her expense to keep chasing them. She has been reasonable and not obstructing the company to collect their goods.

OP how much are the goods worth? Maybe the company feels it is cheaper for them to write this off? I would send one last correspondence in writing saying you will keep the items for x amount of time and if they are not collected or you have not heard from them within that time you will dispose of them. At least then if anything further comes off this you will have told them of your intentions so they may find find it difficult to argue that you have done wrong.

dalesrider

I would keep a close eye on the PP acc. When someone goes through the acc's they will notice goods sent and no money taken and will process the payment.
Given they are aware of the issue.....

fat-pudding

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

It is simple contract law. You ordered the clothes, they performed the contract. In doing so, they mistakenly performed it twice. The law is very clear on 'mistake' - the clothes still belong to the seller.

Please point me at the relevant statute so I can read it. Anyhow, the vendor themselves considered that this was 3 separate contracts. They cancelled the only one that said it was completed, by telling me the other 2 were "cancelled" before the end of the ordering process then they voided the contract and then continued to perform.

Either way, the point isn't about what should or shouldn't be done, it comes down to I'm not wasting time with the vendor as they are useless, I just wanted to know if there's a minimum time I have to hold on to the items, if it is 6 years (although nobody can point me at the relevant statute) then like I already said after 6 months the clothes are going to the charity shop and I'll deal with any fall out then by just claiming that the items were returned when they asked (or that they didn't arrive as neither package was recorded on delivery) and ask for evidence of a contract existing.

fat-pudding

dalesrider wrote: »

I would keep a close eye on the PP acc. When someone goes through the acc's they will notice goods sent and no money taken and will process the payment.
Given they are aware of the issue.....

I already have watched this, when placing the order it gives an authorisation that is valid for 30 days, that authorisation has now expired. They took money from one authorisation but not the other, this is why I'm asking the question as to how long I have to hold on to things for as the authorisation to take the money expired in the middle of last week.

If the vendor comes back to me in the next week (well, 6 months) then it's fine I'll arrange a pick up with them at their expense.

fat-pudding

iammumtoone wrote: »

That is understandable but I feel for the OP, what is she suppose to do? She has told the company three times and they are not responding surely it can't be her responsibility and her expense to keep chasing them. She has been reasonable and not obstructing the company to collect their goods.

Exactly this, it's about £60 of clothes, I even wonder if someone has realised they screwed up and is covering up for their mistake. I've got no intention of keeping things that don't belong to me just I am not spending time and money returning them and chasing as it's not my mistake. I've pointed out the mistake 3 times via phone and email (and I work in IT, they did get the emails, I have the logs to prove it) and they still didn't pursue it.

I think in this situation all I can do is wait 6 months and if I'm feeling charitable then I'll send another email as I'm not storing things forever. Hopefully the paypal authorisation expiring will alert them that they made a mistake and they get in touch with me.

dalesrider

fat-pudding wrote: »

I already have watched this, when placing the order it gives an authorisation that is valid for 30 days, that authorisation has now expired. They took money from one authorisation but not the other, this is why I'm asking the question as to how long I have to hold on to things for as the authorisation to take the money expired in the middle of last week.

If the vendor comes back to me in the next week (well, 6 months) then it's fine I'll arrange a pick up with them at their expense.

Well had you used a visa card and not PP. Then they would have upto 6 months to take the funds and can do without informing you.
No idea if they can do the same via PP. Only a call to PP would tell you what their timescales are.

Re. The statute of limitations. I would say you are looking at 6 years.
My basis for this is you owe them money for order placed, which they dispatched.

Its amazing the number of times a retailer system will say transaction not gone through and a customer still gets debited and the goods...
Even more amazing the number of people who simply make the transaction straight away... Without checking with anyone to see what the issue was.