Parcel2go

Gavin83

Well I completely disagree with Maniak on two counts. Firstly their terms and conditions are pretty clear. Although they’re responsible for refunding the delivery fee if they fail to deliver they are not responsible for the contents. That’s what the insurance is for. If you don’t want to take it that’s fine (and as you say you’re up by not doing so) but then you take on the risk. However given that you’ve broken their terms and conditions by posting to a non valid address they could potentially argue the postage fee is non refundable too so I’d personally take them up on their offer.

Secondly if you did follow Maniaks advice and write them a LBA the court will never entertain a case for £20 anyway. So even if you had a solid case (which you don’t) you’d be out of luck anyway as you can’t realistically take it to court.

You need to chalk this up to experience.

Maniak

I agree, their terms are pretty clear but just because it's a term of the contract, doesn't mean that it is enforceable or can be relied upon. P2G have a duty of care under the CRA to take reasonable skill and care and in my view, they cannot avoid that duty by passing the risk back to the consumer and say, sorry you should have took out insurance just in case we lose your parcel. Why should the consumer be required to obtain insurance for someone else's failures?

Even if the OP had broken the terms and conditions, P2G nevertheless accepted the order and made arrangements for the parcel to be collected so they would still be under a statutory duty to take reasonable care.

Can you back up your claim that a court will never entertain a case for £20? Art. 6 of the Human Rights Act provides an individual with a right to a fair and public hearing to determine their civil (or criminal) rights. If anything, P2G would have to show the claim would fall into the de minimis category and just because it is a small amount being claimed, doesn't automatically mean it would be regarded as de minimis or a trifling matter.

Either way, it is an additional cost to them which would be much more than the £20 being claimed with the only additional cost to the OP being time.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Gavin83 said:

Well I completely disagree with Maniak on two counts. Firstly their terms and conditions are pretty clear. Although they’re responsible for refunding the delivery fee if they fail to deliver they are not responsible for the contents. That’s what the insurance is for. If you don’t want to take it that’s fine (and as you say you’re up by not doing so) but then you take on the risk. However given that you’ve broken their terms and conditions by posting to a non valid address they could potentially argue the postage fee is non refundable too so I’d personally take them up on their offer.

Terms and conditions can say anything that doesn't necessarily mean they are enforceable

Worth a note that these companies don't sell insurance as it would be regulated, they sell "parcel cover". Parcel2Go are very pushy with their cover during the booking process and you can bet it's not because they don't want you to lose out but rather because they make a tidy profit from the up sell. 

I would say they shouldn't accept an order if the courier can't deliver there, there was a thread (on the MSE eBay board I think) recently were a postcode was blocked by TNT on Parcel2Go due to past problems so they do have the facility available. 

mikb

Gavin83 said:

You need to chalk this up to experience.

... and the wider lesson is that Hermes was the courier here, draw your own conclusions ...
I use P2Go a lot, and the only headache ever caused was selecting Hermes -- it didn't take many transactions before I learned that, and went back to using Collect+/Parcelforce!

Treeman3

Hi, I've sent an a message to both parcel2go and Hermes concerning neglect and it is the last communication before action. Is a small claims court the one and only place I can make a claim? Thanks. 

Maniak

What exactly did you email them, did it have all the elements of a letter before action or was it just a two line message?

There isn't anything such as a small claims court. you can file a claim using the Money Claims Online (www.moneyclaim.gov.uk) website but you will need to insert sufficient detail as to the claim and their breach under the CRA so they know the case against them. Too little information and it could be struck out for lack of detail.

Hermione_Granger

Maniak said:

Can you back up your claim that a court will never entertain a case for £20? Art. 6 of the Human Rights Act provides an individual with a right to a fair and public hearing to determine their civil (or criminal) rights.

Just when you think you've seen everything possible on this forum, someone suggests using the Human rights act as the basis for a £20 claim in court!

Maniak

When did I ever suggest that the OP uses the HRA as the basis of their claim?!

Perhaps you may want to re-read the post again.

Hermione_Granger

Maniak said:

When did I ever suggest that the OP uses the HRA as the basis of their claim?!

Perhaps you may want to re-read the post again.

Did you or did you not state that art 6 of the Human rights act provides for the right to a fair and public hearing?
To me, that means that you are saying that because of the HRA, the OP has the right to go to court. If not, why even mention the Human right act in the first place?

Maniak

Yes I did mention it, but that is not the basis of the OP's claim, which is a breach of the CRA.

The reference to the HRA was in response to the previous post which suggested the courts would not entertain a claim of £20 and that the OP wasn't entitled to take his/her claim to court. I was merely pointing out that everyone has a right to a hearing and have their case heard subject to the de minimis rule.