Sportsdirect.com Next-Day delivery - Part of sale conditions or not?

nc11

I ordered around £120 worth of items from sportsdirect.com web-site. Submitted the order in good time for a next-day delivery, for which I've paid the £7.99 charge.

Next day came and went Friday), and at that point I was due to leave abroad. I couldn't wait until Monday so went to the store and got the items I needed. The package showed up on Monday and was returned by a family member straight away (did not open it) using my own courier.

I have requested the order to be fully refunded and the courier costs reimbursed as well. It took them 3 attempts to get the full order refunded, but are refusing to reimburse the courier charges.

Their exact response is "We are under no obligation to refund this delivery costs to you, I do apologise about the delay and we are working towards ensuring this doesn't happen again.". Really?! are delivery conditions not form part of the sale? As I see it they've committed to deliver the full order within the allotted time and failed to do so. Therefore they're responsible for the courier charges.

Am I reading this right or am I way off? the courier cost me £8 btw...

Cheers everyone!

NC11

Browntoa

Moved to consumer rights for better response

DoaM

You need to carefully read what "next day" delivery actually means. In some cases it means the day after the goods have been dispatched, not the day following order.

PS - SD will be using the part of the CCRs where premium delivery charges don't have to be refunded for "change of mind" returns, only standard delivery charges. Your argument will be "breach of contract", but see my first paragraph.

Ultimately, how much is your time worth chasing this (for £7.99)?

unholyangel

Their T&C's state orders placed before 6pm sunday to friday will be delivered within 1 day. They were in breach of contract and should refund the full amount.

If they weren't in breach (they are but just to address the point), they still cannot refuse to refund the delivery charge in full as the Consumer Contract (Information, Cancellation & Additional Charges) Regulations dictate that they must refund the amount charged for standard delivery and are only allowed to deduct the difference between standard delivery and premium delivery.

Of course, sports direct are notoriously shifty when it comes to consumer rights and I wouldn't expect any of their staff to have been trained in breach of contract or anything remote similar.

dj1471

unholyangel wrote: »

Their T&C's state orders placed before 6pm sunday to friday will be delivered within 1 day. They were in breach of contract and should refund the full amount.

I couldn't find any general T&Cs but the delivery page says:

If you select our Next Day Delivery option, and your order is placed and accepted before 6pm Sunday - Friday, we aim to have your order delivered to your door the very next day.

Emphasis mine.

unholyangel

dj1471 wrote: »

I couldn't find any general T&Cs but the delivery page says:
Emphasis mine.

Its a good idea to keep paragraphs whole rather than selectively reading or quoting them.

Next Day Delivery

If you select the Next Day Delivery option, and your order is placed and accepted before 6pm Sunday to Friday, we aim to have your order delivered to your door within one (1) day provided the next day is not a Sunday or Public/Bank Holiday. Orders placed after 6pm will take an extra 24 hours to deliver (excludes Weekends and Public/Bank Holidays).

You're placing too much emphasis on the one word "aim". It is not the same as a clause excluding liability for failure to meet deadlines and even if it was, the OP agreed to pay £7.99 in exchange for next day delivery - the terms of which are as above. The OP paid 7.99 yet SD did not provide the consideration they agreed to provide. Indeed, it looks like they did not even provide express delivery (1 to 2 days). OP said the next day came and went - friday. They also had saturday to deliver as you'll notice their own terms state unless the next day is a sunday or public holiday.

It can be inferred by the selection of next day delivery that time was of the essence - if it wasn't, they'd have picked standard delivery. Therefore by not meeting the deadline, they are in breach and the OP is entitled to repudiate the contract.

nc11

Thanks folks. I'll try to summarise the info from the t&c's into an email and send it across with a little more assertion.. will let you know what the response is!

Fosterdog

What time of day did you place the order and what time did you get your order acceptance email (not just order acknowledgement)?

It does make it clear that both order and acceptance have to be in place before 6pm for next day delivery. I placed an order with them yesterday around 4:30pm and got the acknowledgement email straight away but have not yet had the order acceptance email so even though I haven't chosen next day delivery if I had it wouldn't count until acceptance.