Returning an online purchase of a Smart TV - John Lewis will not accept the return????

allanjones74

Hi all, and thanks for any advice in advance.
I recently purchased an LG smart TV from John Lewis for my parents.  Since I don't buy TV's everyday, I wasn'tsavvy enough to pick up on the fact that LG TV's no longer support Freeview Play, and as such my parents cant get access to catch up players such as All4 My5 ITV hub etc.  I only noticed this when I tried to set up the TV.

As a result I called John Lewis to request a return as my parents do not utilise any type of TV box that can fill this gap.  However John Lewis are refusing the return due to the "GDPR" law.  They are saying that if we have input any personal data onto the TV, then they are no longer are required to accept the return.  Further to that they have said that they had a disclaimer on the website description - which is true, at the very end of the description.

The TV is only 1 day old, still has labels on it, is not damaged in any way, was bought online, paid by credit card.
My question is - has anyone else have experience of companies not accepting returns of "Smart" products for similar reasons?

wongataa

If you perform a full reset on the TV then there is no personal information on it.

Just tell them there has been no personal information entered on the TV if they ask.  Keep trying.

giraffe69

I have an LG TV and it has apps for all the items you mention. Its about 18 months old. Does this one not have a series of apps>

allanjones74

giraffe69 said:

I have an LG TV and it has apps for all the items you mention. Its about 18 months old. Does this one not have a series of apps>

No, LG havent renewed their licence for freeview play for 2020.  So yes older TV's still have all the freeview play apps, but not TV's of 2020.  They only got BBC iplayer back in August this year.

tacpot12

This is standard policy for John Lewis (I remember an earlier post on MSE), however I don't think it is legally correct.

The issue that John Lewis raised was that by entering your router's WiFi password all your data becomes accessible if you return the TV. In theory, changing the password on on the TV would be sufficient to prevent anyone at John Lewis being able to access data on your home network. However, for this to work, I expect you might have change your router password to a new value, set the TV to use this new password and allow the TV to connect to the WiFi using this password, then change the password on the router back to its original value that you know. This should protect John Lewis from any possibility that their staff can access your home network (they don't want to be liable for this, which is reasonable). 

If John Lewis come back and confirm say that this still isn't good enough because the LG TV stores a number of previous WiFi passwords, I think this can be used to make a claim under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 as the TV is not of satisfactory quality - the design flaw of storing more than the current WiFi password makes it impossible (or absurdly difficult) to return the TV to its retailer. This should also be the case if the TV offers a "Factory Reset" option but John Lewis maintain that this does not clear down all the WiFi passwords that are stored. It should, and the TV is not of satisfactory quality if it does not, because this prevents returning the TV.

This is should not be acceptable in the UK market. John Lewis are liable if the TV is not of satisfactory quality. Definitely worth taking this to the County Court as a test case!

I would also try speaking to Which! magazine about this. They may like to support you with this. 

Note that under the Consumer Rights Act 2105 you have a right to refund if the product isn't of sufficient quality.  John Lewis have to refund you your money, but don't have to take the TV back if they don't want to. They can leave it with you - it's their choice to do so. The thing they don't have a choice over is refunding your money. 

Petriix

Buy them a Chromecast and they will be able to watch anything.

allanjones74

Petriix said:

Buy them a Chromecast and they will be able to watch anything.

The point is they don't want additional devices to contend with - they want to keep it simple, with one device/one remote.  My father is in the very early stages of dementia, and we need to keep things as simple as possible for him.

roddydogs

Well my 2018 lg has freeview play, its clunky and not worth the bother. But it is totally separate from catch up services provided by BBC, Itv ch 4 etc, does it not have these at all?

photome

roddydogs said:

Well my 2018 lg has freeview play, its clunky and not worth the bother. But it is totally separate from catch up services provided by BBC, Itv ch 4 etc, does it not have these at all?

OP answered that above

Undervalued

wongataa said:

If you perform a full reset on the TV then there is no personal information on it.

Just tell them there has been no personal information entered on the TV if they ask.  Keep trying.

You might like to think that.
The personal data may be difficult for a casual user to access following a "reset" but I bet it could be recovered by anyone with more advance skills, let alone a forensic department.

jon81uk

I have an LG TV with Freeview Play, but I've never used it.
I just went into the LG content store and downloaded the Apps.
For example ITV https://gb.lgappstv.com/main/tvapp/detail?appId=349335&catCode1=&moreYn=N&cateYn=N&orderType=0&headerName=&appRankCode=&sellrUsrNo=