Free item on a website - i think not!!

hollydays

To put it in simple terms- if you owned a shop and an item had accidentally been priced at £0- do you really think the law would force you to sell it to the customer.

JimmyTheWig

Goleo wrote: »

But they have taken payment - does that not constitute a contract being formed?

Firstly the items in question were £0, so they didn't take a payment for them!
Secondly, no - the contract is normally formed when goods are shipped.

I bought a couple of other items off the site, but i probably wouldn't have bought the item that was listed at £0, not for that price of £20.

Then having the free items cancelled is the best that you can legally expect.
And if they don't have any of your items in stock a full refund is the best you can legally expect.

Personally I would have honoured it, or at least offered a token gift of lesser value as it was their error.

That's a question of customer service rather than consumer rights.
Some companies go above what is legally required of them to keep a customer happy. E.g. give away a £5 goodwill item on the basis that this customer will spend £100 in the future. Makes business sense.
But other companies don't. Why give something away to a customer who may never use us again?
It's up to them how they want to treat their customers.

I know it was a long shot.
...
They didn't apologise and were quite rude on the phone - pretty much acted as if it was my fault!

It was a long shot. It was pretty obviously a mistake on their part. You could have ignored it and carried on with the rest of your shopping. Or you could have tried to take advantage.
Their fault for making the error in the first place. Your fault for trying to take advantage.
As long as no-one loses out over the error then all is fine.
You now know that this is a company who aren't interested in customer service. Whether you use them again or not, given that, is up to you.

AJXX

"I tried to take advantage of a company who had a very obvious pricing error on their website and now they've cancelled my order and have bad customer service"

Quit moaning OP.

irishjohn

Goleo wrote: »

But they have taken payment - does that not constitute a contract being formed?

Payment taken for particular items equals zilch - could be interpreted to be a contract being formed.

Nothing sent for Zilch Payment taken - Does that not constitute a contract being fulfilled? (Just Saying!) :cool:

SeduLOUs

irishjohn wrote: »

Payment taken for particular items equals zilch - could be interpreted to be a contract being formed.

Nothing sent for Zilch Payment taken - Does that not constitute a contract being fulfilled? (Just Saying!) :cool:

No. There has to be consideration from both sides to form a binding contract. You can't contract with someone to give them something for free.

You can give a gift for free, but it's pretty obvious that wasn't the intention of the retailer.

robatwork

Goleo wrote: »

I bit of friendly advise would be appreciated. Where do I stand on this?

OK here's my advice. Firstly some grammar policing - it's advice. Secondly you don't stand as you haven't got a leg to stand on.

HTH

tykesi

robatwork wrote: »

OK here's my advice. Firstly some grammar policing - it's advice.

That's spelling rather than grammar.

antrobus

Do shops have to sell goods at the advertised price?
The simple answer is NO!

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=41583538&postcount=10

George_Michael

tykesi wrote: »

That's spelling rather than grammar.

Not necessarily.
If they thought that "advise" was the correct word to use in the context that they wrote it then it is a grammatical error.
However, if they knew that "advice" was the correct word but they either mistyped or didn't know that there should be a "c" instead of an "s", then it's a spelling error.

tykesi

Thanks for the education...

Almost like a Father Figure