Trying to get a refund on a gift card bought online

Dietcokefiend

I'm trying to find out if I can get a refund on a physical gift card I bought online. The retailer were super slow to dispatch a gift card to me and so I bought something else for my sister. It's only £30 but I now have a pointless gift card. 

I contacted them saying they were slow, please can I return it but they said no as gift cards are excluded under terms and conditions. They were then quite rude to me, made up fake legal sounding jargon and then promised to ring me back but never did. 

 I thought the old distance selling regulations had said gift cards were covered so not sure if the Customer Contract Regulations have the same meaning as it's not clear. This isn't a digital voucher, it's a physical card with a gift bag all purchased online. I've not used it, or even opened it!  Happy to be wrong but just seems silly that this is excluded.

jon81uk

Did they make any promises about the despatch time? Did you pay for express shipping?

[Deleted User]

 Irrelevant if they made no promises. It can be returned 
https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/regulation/consumer-contracts-regulations-ajWHC8m21cAk#cancelling-goods-and-services

Aylesbury_Duck

Yes, I think this one was cleared up on an old thread.  Gift cards that are unused fall under the CCRs that allow a return as a "distance sale".

Dietcokefiend

Thank all for the advice. It was 1-3 working days but then that got messed up with bank holidays, etc.
They were REALLY rude about it and how trading law (with no definition) says they dont have to and it's in terms and conditions which has just made me more determined to find a way to sort this.

It's only £30 but the principle of it all...

Dietcokefiend

An update -

After getting nowhere except some blunt refusals over email and left for weeks at a time, I went straight to the MD  and strangely th emails started to resolve things (yeah I know and I don't like being that guy, but they were really rude).

I asked for a reason on why gift cards were not covered. After a few more weeks back and forth I got a refund but no one ever explained why it wasn't covered - just that their legal team said they were happy as they were.

[Deleted User]

Good on you for sticking with it ♥️

mattyprice4004

Out of interest, what date was it ordered and when was it delivered? 

I used to run an online retailer and the amount of complaints for orders that were were delivered within the timescale the customer had agreed to was staggering. 

Note 1-3 days is dispatch time, so add another 2-3 days on that for Royal Mail 48 or similar (and then the bank holiday on top) 

Sandtree

mattyprice4004 said:

I used to run an online retailer and the amount of complaints for orders that were were delivered within the timescale the customer had agreed to was staggering. 

I suspect if you ran it now you'd get even more complaints. 1) Most people dont bother reading things like dispatch times and 2) people's expectations of what good looks like are being set by the likes of Amazon who can deliver most things within 24 hours.

Was interested in seeing that a couple of shops that I have occasionally bought from that sell sartorial menswear changed their websites since the lockdowns from the 7-10 days for delivery (or even click and collect) they were since opening online sales to 1-2 days. I'd cancelled a few baskets when getting to the end and seeing the timescales.