Customer Has Returned Damaged Goods

pinkshoes

I disagree with lots of these posts.

Obviously the OP has the contract with the courier, BUT... as he cannot possibly visit the buyer, pack the printer up, then hand it over the the courier himself, then there is a reasonable amount of common sense and responsibility required from the buyer to pack it up in a suitable manner to be shipped.

If they had suitably packaged it, and then it got damaged, then the OP would have to refund and claim from the courier.

I would see this as the buyer being negligent.

paulwilko10

pinkshoes wrote: »

I disagree with lots of these posts.

Obviously the OP has the contract with the courier, BUT... as he cannot possibly visit the buyer, pack the printer up, then hand it over the the courier himself, then there is a reasonable amount of common sense and responsibility required from the buyer to pack it up in a suitable manner to be shipped.

If they had suitably packaged it, and then it got damaged, then the OP would have to refund and claim from the courier.

I would see this as the buyer being negligent.

I would love to think you are correct, so how do i find out before I goto the next step?

Thanks again everyone

unholyangel

Undervalued wrote: »

The customer did exactly what you asked regarding packing! Read your own quote! They have no contract with a courier (well box shifting company) you arranged. They are under no obligation to have retained any internal packaging (or indeed the box). Recovering a faulty item safely is entirely your problem.

The customer is not under any obligation to contact HP. You sold the printer to them and they are quite entitled to only deal with you.

I am afraid you have just got to learn from this and make safer arrangements in the future.

No, but they were under an obligation to take reasonable care of the goods and make them available for collection. IMO making them available for collection would include ensuring they are adequately packaged.

Did anyone already ask OP about their customer and whether it was a consumer or a b2b (i'm being too lazy to go back and check)? Just I can't see many consumers paying £400 for a printer.

paulwilko10

unholyangel wrote: »

No, but they were under an obligation to take reasonable care of the goods and make them available for collection. IMO making them available for collection would include ensuring they are adequately packaged.

Did anyone already ask OP about their customer and whether it was a consumer or a b2b (i'm being too lazy to go back and check)? Just I can't see many consumers paying £400 for a printer.

Bought under a name but for business use, not sure how i prove that though if she dug her heels in

unholyangel

paulwilko10 wrote: »

Bought under a name but for business use, not sure how i prove that though if she dug her heels in

Were there any discussions leading up to the purchase where she told you it was for business use/mentioned being a trader? Delivered to a business address? Did she mention at any point what purpose she bought the printer for?

I still think what I said above might help if she's a consumer - that she has a statutory duty of care & a duty to make the goods available for collection (which imo would include adequate packaging). But it would be a whole lot easier for you if she was a business as consumer rights act, consumer contract regulations would not apply. However, it would be up to you to show that she was acting in the course of her business/trade/craft/profession - but thats only likely to apply if the buyer denies it and tries to claim she's a consumer/acting outside of her trade/profession/craft.

Undervalued

paulwilko10 wrote: »

Courier aside, surely they are under obligation to keep packaging because if they wanted to return just because they felt like it, surely it has to be in original packing otherwise it can be refunded less the value due to it not being in original packing?

No they are not!

They may be reducing their right to get a refund on a non faulty item by choosing not to keep the packaging but that is irrelevant as it is not what has happened here.

They said the item was faulty and you agree to have it collected. Because it got damaged on the way back you cannot now establish whether it was indeed faulty or not.

As I said earlier, taken literally, they did exactly what you said.

Undervalued

unholyangel wrote: »

No, but they were under an obligation to take reasonable care of the goods and make them available for collection. IMO making them available for collection would include ensuring they are adequately packaged.

Reasonable care is only relevant if they did something to it that caused the fault or were returning a non faulty item for refund. If they say marked the case but it developed an electrical fault internally they are still entitled to have the fault repaired foc.

The did make it available for collection in exactly the way the OP specified in his quote.

So all that remains is if they should actually have done more than he said? As I mentioned much earlier they may have been expecting it to be collected by a door to door van and not a parcel service?

paulwilko10

I can confirm her billing and delivery address includes the business name.

She has just phoned me and because she uses UPS on a daily basis, she believed it would make it back in one piece, how wrong she was.

wealdroam

paulwilko10 wrote: »

I can confirm her billing and delivery address includes the business name.

She has just phoned me and because she uses UPS on a daily basis, she believed it would make it back in one piece, how wrong she was.

Both those sentences go a good way towards confirming that a business made the purchase, thus, as mentioned earlier, the 'consumer protection legislation' will not protect her.

unholyangel

Undervalued wrote: »

Reasonable care is only relevant if they did something to it that caused the fault or were returning a non faulty item for refund. If they say marked the case but it developed an electrical fault internally they are still entitled to have the fault repaired foc.

The did make it available for collection in exactly the way the OP specified in his quote.

So all that remains is if they should actually have done more than he said? As I mentioned much earlier they may have been expecting it to be collected by a door to door van and not a parcel service?

I think perhaps you're looking at it the wrong way.

I'm not saying shes liable for the faulty item. However a statutory duty of care arises. Everyone has a statutory duty of care to their neighbour - to ensure that any acts or omissions on your part do not cause harm/damage to others that are close/direct enough to be affected by your actions/omissions.

Or as said in Donoghue v Stevenson:

"The rule that you are to love your neighbour becomes in law you must not injure your neighbour; and the lawyer's question " Who is my ' neighbour ?" receives a restricted reply. You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbour. Who then in law is my neighbour? The answer seems to be persons who are so closely and directly affected by my act that I ought reasonably to have them in contemplation as being so affected when I am directing my mind to the acts or omissions which are called in question."

So a duty of care was owed.
imo they were in breach of that duty by not adequately packaging the item
imo the breach caused the damage - the damage may have happened in transit but would not have happened if not for the customers failure to use protective packaging, therefore satisfies the "but for" test that the breach is the cause of the damage
imo the damage was not too remote