Warranty eligible for section 75?

Ditzy_Mitzy

Yayhelen said:

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

Apparently you still can make a claim under the warranty:
If my company is liquidated, am I personally liable? (begbies-traynorgroup.com)
Leesa (UK) is in liquidation, your claim is against that entity rather than the US parent.  The two are incorporated in separate jurisdictions; your purchase does not fall under the auspices of American law.  The likelihood is that you will end up on the unsecured creditor list.  Good luck!  
If you prefer: there isn't a specific time limit for a Section 75 claim, but there's a requirement for any such claim to be based on breach of contract or misrepresentation.  Have you got anything that guarantees, or implies, that the mattress will last a specific number of years?  I can't see a breach of contract here as it involves a straightforward sale and the goods have been supplied.  

I was hoping that the fact they will not fulfill warranty is a breech of contract?

The difficulty is that Amazon hasn't breached its contract, which was to supply and deliver the mattress.  Your payment was to Amazon, so the S75 claim will proceed against Amazon.  Amazon will, in all likelihood, oppose the claim on the basis there was no breach of contract or misrepresentation.  
The warranty claim is separate, as the warranty itself is provided by Leesa.  It's not related to Amazon.  You can still attempt to pursue a claim under warranty, but the likelihood of success is diminished by the fact that the company providing the warranty is in liquidation.  
There would not appear to be a case for a faulty goods claim against the retailer either.  For that, as the purchase was made more than six months ago, you would have to prove that the fault existed at the time of purchase.  As confirmed, there was no fault at the time of purchase.  Your frustration comes from the mattress failing after three years.  The goods were not, therefore, faulty, rather they were insufficiently durable.  I agree with your interpretation, unfortunately doing something about it is complicated.

George_Michael

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

The difficulty is that Amazon hasn't breached its contract, which was to supply and deliver the mattress.  Your payment was to Amazon, so the S75 claim will proceed against Amazon.  Amazon will, in all likelihood, oppose the claim on the basis there was no breach of contract or misrepresentation.  

The S75 claim doesn't have to be against Amazon. It can be against the credit provider as they hold equal liability for the contract and if the mattress was sold with the promise of a 10 year warranty and this warranty is no longer being provided, there is a clear breach of contract, something for which a successful S75 claim against the credit card company may well be possible especially if the advert released by Amazon highlighted the 10 year warranty.

Ditzy_Mitzy said:
There would not appear to be a case for a faulty goods claim against the retailer either.  For that, as the purchase was made more than six months ago, you would have to prove that the fault existed at the time of purchase.  As confirmed, there was no fault at the time of purchase.  Your frustration comes from the mattress failing after three years.  The goods were not, therefore, faulty, rather they were insufficiently durable.  I agree with your interpretation, unfortunately doing something about it is complicated.

Maybe not faulty at the time of sale but it certainly sounds as if they are faulty now.
For a successful CRA claim, the fault doesn't need to have been present at the time of purchase, simply the cause of the fault needs to have been there.
This could be something such as substandard materials that have worn out far sooner than expected or poor assembly.

Yayhelen

Thank you all. Very helpful! 

I didn’t pay, my husband paid and Inhave got him to send me the details now. It was from Leesa but he paid via Amazon Pay on his credit card statement it shows as:
AMZ* Leesa Sleep Ltd Amazon Pay LU

Think we may as well write to the card provider, the worst that can happen is they can refuse.

From my reading they may refute the claim simply because it’s paid via a third party payment processor (Amazon Pay) or because it’s not a breech of contract.

I am on maternity leave at the minute and a new superking mattress isn’t really in our budget so it’s worth a try!

arthurfowler

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

Yayhelen said:

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

Apparently you still can make a claim under the warranty:
If my company is liquidated, am I personally liable? (begbies-traynorgroup.com)
Leesa (UK) is in liquidation, your claim is against that entity rather than the US parent.  The two are incorporated in separate jurisdictions; your purchase does not fall under the auspices of American law.  The likelihood is that you will end up on the unsecured creditor list.  Good luck!  
If you prefer: there isn't a specific time limit for a Section 75 claim, but there's a requirement for any such claim to be based on breach of contract or misrepresentation.  Have you got anything that guarantees, or implies, that the mattress will last a specific number of years?  I can't see a breach of contract here as it involves a straightforward sale and the goods have been supplied.  

I was hoping that the fact they will not fulfill warranty is a breech of contract?

The difficulty is that Amazon hasn't breached its contract, which was to supply and deliver the mattress.  Your payment was to Amazon, so the S75 claim will proceed against Amazon.  Amazon will, in all likelihood, oppose the claim on the basis there was no breach of contract or misrepresentation.  
The warranty claim is separate, as the warranty itself is provided by Leesa.  It's not related to Amazon.  You can still attempt to pursue a claim under warranty, but the likelihood of success is diminished by the fact that the company providing the warranty is in liquidation.  
There would not appear to be a case for a faulty goods claim against the retailer either.  For that, as the purchase was made more than six months ago, you would have to prove that the fault existed at the time of purchase.  As confirmed, there was no fault at the time of purchase.  Your frustration comes from the mattress failing after three years.  The goods were not, therefore, faulty, rather they were insufficiently durable.  I agree with your interpretation, unfortunately doing something about it is complicated.

From my understanding the fault needs to be an inherent fault, rather than being there at the time of purchase. If there is an inherent fault which means that it does not last as long as reasonably expected, then the fault was present and is inherent. 

Also, if a 10 year warranty was promised at the time of the purchase and that 10 year warranty is no longer available, I would have thought that would constitute a breach of the contract? 

Proving all this may be the tricky part though! 

born_again

Yayhelen said: Pay on his credit card statement it shows as:

AMZ* Leesa Sleep Ltd Amazon Pay LU

As far as S75 goes that is the killer.
Payment is via Amazon Pay.
Lost the debitor, creditor link.

arthurfowler

born_again said:

Yayhelen said: Pay on his credit card statement it shows as:

AMZ* Leesa Sleep Ltd Amazon Pay LU

As far as S75 goes that is the killer.
Payment is via Amazon Pay.
Lost the debitor, creditor link.

That's always been a grey area no? Using Amazon Pay is not guaranteed for it to be rejected. Barclaycard honoured one of my claims after using Amazon Pay a few years ago. Still worth a try.

George_Michael

born_again said:

Yayhelen said: Pay on his credit card statement it shows as:

AMZ* Leesa Sleep Ltd Amazon Pay LU

As far as S75 goes that is the killer.
Payment is via Amazon Pay.
Lost the debitor, creditor link.

Maybe, maybe not.
The use of a payment provider doesn't always mean that S75 doesn't apply especially as the credit card statement shows the sellers trading details and if it does get turned down, it would be worth contacting the financial ombudsman for their advice.
Revealed: Section 75 credit card protection may fail due to payment processing loophole - shoppers beware (moneysavingexpert.com)

It's not uncommon for payments to be made via a third-party payment system, particularly to process credit card payments. However, there are many different types of payment mechanisms and not all of them prevent Section 75 from applying.

Where there is a dispute on this point, we look at the specific payment mechanism used and decide whether Section 75 applies in the particular case.

So if someone has been turned down by their bank or credit card provider and are concerned they have been treated unfairly they can get in touch with the Financial Ombudsman Service and we'll look at the complaint independently to decide if something has gone wrong.

• It doesn't matter what's on your statement. Just because a credit card statement names a third-party payment firm, doesn't necessarily mean the link has been broken – and you MAY still have Section 75 protection.

Yayhelen

Thanks all