After 'free' consultation I'm being chased by debt collectors for consultation charge

JimBlack

Thanks all for the responses.

Nothing was signed at any point.

The issue over the 1st appointment only being free was one that concerned me - in hindsight I should have clarified if the 2nd and 3rd appointments were also free.

The only mention of cost was an all inclusive fee of £5k for surgery, consultations and aftercare. When I asked how they reached £150 they said it was a standard fee for an unlimited number of pre-surgery consultations. They also said that it's normally added on to the final fee, something which is confusing given that the only mention of a charge if the all inclusive fee.

ScorpiondeRooftrouser

A builder would give you a quote for an extension, he wouldn't tell you the cost of digging the foundations. But if you ask him to stop after digging the foundations, you wouldn't expect him not to charge you at all.

The fact that they didn't ask you to a sign a contract does seem unusual for an organisation one would expect to be professional, but doesn't mean no contract exists. Were the additional consultations presented as allowing to decide if you wanted surgery, or had you indicated that you wanted the surgery and they were presented as the beginning of the process?

JimBlack

All appointments were pre-surgery in the sense of no decision was made. I'd mentioned to them I was yet to sort out finance so I hadn't committed to anything.

HappyMJ

JimBlack wrote: »

All appointments were pre-surgery in the sense of no decision was made. I'd mentioned to them I was yet to sort out finance so I hadn't committed to anything.

Don't worry about it.

Having an outstanding debt like this will not affect your credit rating just yet. To affect your credit rating they would need to go to court. You would have to lose the case and then not pay the judgement in 28 days. The likelihood of that happening is very low.

[Deleted User]

JimBlack wrote: »

in hindsight I should have clarified if the 2nd and 3rd appointments were also free.

This is the crux of the matter.

djmsemcgrath

ScorpiondeRooftrouser wrote: »

Hang on, are people suggesting that if a hairdresser says to you "You should let me cut your hair", and makes an appointment for you to come into their shop and do so, they can't charge for it unless they have expressly said they intend to?

I would have said the offer of the free consultation would, in the absence of further evidence, clearly be taken as referring to the first consultation only - indeed, the very fact of flagging this one up as free is confirmation of the fact that consultations are generally chargeable. The contract would be formed when further consultations were offered and agreed to.

That's a good point. Similar to a pub - if a bartender says "what can I get you?" is that him offering to give you a drink for free? When does a contract form, and when is it legally binding that you will pay for the service?

ThumbRemote

ScorpiondeRooftrouser wrote: »

Hang on, are people suggesting that if a hairdresser says to you "You should let me cut your hair", and makes an appointment for you to come into their shop and do so, they can't charge for it unless they have expressly said they intend to?

I would have said the offer of the free consultation would, in the absence of further evidence, clearly be taken as referring to the first consultation only - indeed, the very fact of flagging this one up as free is confirmation of the fact that consultations are generally chargeable. The contract would be formed when further consultations were offered and agreed to.

damianjmcgrath wrote: »

That's a good point. Similar to a pub - if a bartender says "what can I get you?" is that him offering to give you a drink for free? When does a contract form, and when is it legally binding that you will pay for the service?

The differences would be:
1. In a hairdressers and a bar the price list should be on display. It is uncertain whether this was so in the OPs case.
2. The cost of the contract being entered into is different in scale.
3. In the bar example, there is no ambiguity over where previous free drinks end and paid ones begin.

The consumer protection from unfair trading regulations includes the following clauses:

A commercial practice is a misleading omission if ...
(a)the commercial practice omits material information,
(b)the commercial practice hides material information,
(c)the commercial practice provides material information in a manner which is unclear, unintelligible, ambiguous or untimely, or
(d)the commercial practice fails to identify its commercial intent, unless this is already apparent from the context,
and as a result it causes or is likely to cause the average consumer to take a transactional decision he would not have taken otherwise.

Where a commercial practice is an invitation to purchase, the following information will be material ...
the price, including any taxes; or where the nature of the product is such that the price cannot reasonably be calculated in advance, the manner in which the price is calculated;

By failing to provide clear pricing information in advance of the further consultations the surgeons have breached these regulations. As such the OP owes them nothing, and the surgeons business have comitted an offence under this act.

(Incidentally, there is something of an argument that the phrase "you should let me cut your hair" also fall fouls of these regulations under the clause "fails to identify its commercial intent" - it could depend on the context in which the offer is made. There's an amibguity in the wording of "let me"; it implies the one asking is requesting a favour rather than offering a business service.)

daytona0

ThumbRemote wrote: »

By failing to provide clear pricing information in advance of the further consultations the surgeons have breached these regulations. As such the OP owes them nothing, and the surgeons business have comitted an offence under this act.

But in your post you also said " the price list should be on display. It is uncertain whether this was so in the OPs case. " :huh:

So if you are uncertain as to whether the price list was on display, how can you conclude that they failed "to provide clear pricing information in advance of the further consultations"?

ThumbRemote

daytona0 wrote: »

But in your post you also said " the price list should be on display. It is uncertain whether this was so in the OPs case. " :huh:

So if you are uncertain as to whether the price list was on display, how can you conclude that they failed "to provide clear pricing information in advance of the further consultations"?

In the event that clear pricing was on display, then of course the retailer would have a full defence and OP would be liable to pay it.

However it seems rather unlikely that such a price list was clearly on display, given that if it were it would have negated the point of OP posting as they'd have seen it.

daytona0

ThumbRemote wrote: »

In the event that clear pricing was on display, then of course the retailer would have a full defence and OP would be liable to pay it.

However it seems rather unlikely that such a price list was clearly on display, given that if it were it would have negated the point of OP posting as they'd have seen it.

True, but I'd fancy a surgery of any kind (especially private) being transparent in their pricing.

Just wanted to highlight your post more because it might give OP the impression that they are 100% able to ignore this debt.