Amazon price glitch - do they have to honour ?

mrsaof

Hi All ,

Please help.
On Saturday amazon had a few price glitches and a few of us nabbed a great bundle of furniture for half nothing.
Today I got an email saying items have been dispatched. I want to know can the supplier still cancel the order even tho its been dispatched and what can I do if this happens.

Thanks Mrsaof

visidigi

Yes they can and nothing.

CM66

I'm pretty sure that once the item has been dispatched, then technically the company has agreed to fulfill the booking and they cannot rescind on the price......

daytona0

mrsaof wrote: »

Hi All ,

Please help.
On Saturday amazon had a few price glitches and a few of us nabbed a great bundle of furniture for half nothing.
Today I got an email saying items have been dispatched. I want to know can the supplier still cancel the order even tho its been dispatched and what can I do if this happens.

Thanks Mrsaof

Well, two hypothetical situations:

1. What happens if they run out of stock despite notifying you of dispatch, or what happens if that is their last item and it goes missing in transit? Simple, you will end up with A FULL REFUND! You may be able to debate a possible loss of bargain but as you have clearly said above it was due to a pricing error, and you'd need to argue loss of bargain in court and being a good citizen you would surely not lie in court

2. What happens if you were selling a piece of furniture for 100 pounds and found out that you had only received a pound for it? Would you relentlessly pursue the pound difference/item back? I think you would


Thus, they CAN (and hopefully will) cancel and refund the order.

You can consider going to court for something like loss of bargain, but I don't think you've lost a bargain but rather tried to take advantage of a pricing error So good luck with that.

InquisitiveMind

Amazon could be at fault, and list items incorrectly. Some sellers use automated software which sets the price to be the lowest price between certain pre-determined competitors and this could have gone a bit haywire.

When prices are listed due to a fault, I doubt it's a legally binding contract.

unholyangel

Unilateral Mistake
A unilateral mistake is where only one party is mistaken and the other party knows about it and takes advantage of the error. A unilateral mistake also negates consent and the existence of an agreement.

(i) Unilateral mistake as to the terms of the contract
For a unilateral mistake to be operative, it must relate to the terms of the contract. This type of mistake occurs where one party is aware of the mistake and takes advantage of the other party’s error. Such a mistake will render the contract void.
In the case of Hartog v Colin and Shields (1939) the seller had made a mistake as to the price of goods and it was held that the buyer must have realised the mistake and as it concerned a term of the contract, the contract was held to be void.

From:
http://www.drukker.co.uk/publications/l/law-mistake-uk/#.VZtLsflVhBc