Free orders due to website error

JezB

I recently ordered goods online and was lucky enough to receive a promotion offer so that the order was free of charge. I received automated emails confirming these orders were free of charge. The email stated no payment would be taken and the goods would be dispatched shortly. However the customer service dept of the company emailed me soon after to say there was a glitch on the website and that employee error on the programming of the website allowed all goods ordered to be flagged up as free. They stated that my orders (more than one) had been cancelled.

Are they allowed to cancel these free orders and what customer rights do I have. Is this is a glitch and error that is the responsibility of the company, but still a legal and binding transaction which they confirmed, and legally they should honour my order? They claim this is not so, but have not gone into detail.

Any advice welcome.
Thanks

robatwork

JezB wrote: »

Are they allowed to cancel these free orders and what customer rights do I have. Is this is a glitch and error that is the responsibility of the company, but still a legal and binding transaction which they confirmed, and legally they should honour my order? They claim this is not so, but have not gone into detail.

Any advice welcome.
Thanks

In order:
Yes
None
Yes
No
No.

To sum up: You are entitled to the goods or your money back. The company have chosen to give you your money back.

unholyangel

JezB wrote: »

Are they allowed to cancel these free orders and what customer rights do I have. Is this is a glitch and error that is the responsibility of the company, but still a legal and binding transaction which they confirmed, and legally they should honour my order? They claim this is not so, but have not gone into detail.

Let me remedy that for you.

There are certain things that are required in order to form a legally binding contract. One of those requirements is consideration. Consideration need not be adequate but it must be something of value and must move from the promisor to the promisee, it must not be past. You don't seem to have agreed any consideration here so there is no contract. Also, many online retailers will state in their T&C's that acceptance takes place upon dispatch - meaning even if they hadn't made a mistake in price, unless they dispatch the goods to you, there is no contract for you to enforce.

In addition to that, even if you had promised consideration, a contract can be void for certain reasons - one of which is a unilateral mistake. A unilateral mistake is where one party makes a mistake and the other party was aware of the mistake (or should have been aware of the mistake).

So if a £500 tv is priced at £400 by mistake - that contract usually will not be void for mistake.

While if the same tv was priced at £50, that will be void ab initio as you really should have been aware that it was a pricing error rather than a genuine price.