Selling products and taking money then saying out of stock

sam3103

Basically I took advantage of a websites deal on Black Friday which was 50% off everything on their website.
They accepted the order and took the money from my account but after 5 days the tracking area on their website showed my order had not been despatched so I contacted them.
They are now saying there has been a problem in their warehouse and they may have to cancel my order if they can not resolve it.
After looking on social media I find many customers are having the same problem and some have even had their orders cancelled without being notified. I wasn't informed of anything until I contacted them myself.

It is my assumption that two things may have occurred here: a. They sold more stock than what they actually had
B. They didn't realise the offer would be as popular as it was and are now fobbing customers off so they don't lose money

My question is, is there anything I can do if they do cancel my order as they clearly advertised items for sale that they either did not have or were not willing to sell.

tykesi

Depends on the terms and conditions you agreed to at the time of the sale. Many companies state a contract is only formed upon despatch of the goods. If that's the case in your situation you're entitled to a refund but nothing else if the company decide not to get more stock in to honour the orders.

gettingtheresometime

I think that a lot of these problems are caused by the way that Companies record the stock levels.


So say for example they have 10 of a particular item on the shelf at the start of the day. As people place an order for that item it's my opinion that a lot of companies don't decrease the amount showing as being in stock at that point but wait until the item is physically picked off the shelf.


At the end of the day if they haven't got the item to send to you then they can't really send it can they?

Hintza

sam3103 wrote: »

My question is, is there anything I can do if they do cancel my order

Indeed, buy elsewhere and don't use them again. If enough do it they won't be around much longer.