The Range fraudulent scam! Be aware!

eddddy · 13 June 2021 at 8:43AM

A quick look at their website T&Cs - they say things like:

"Partner/Trusted Partner/Marketplace Partner" means our third-party sellers who have been invited to sell goods on Our Websites

So when their agent said the courier had cancelled the order - maybe they meant their "Partner" (or third party seller) cancelled it.

And...

"Order Acceptance Event" means the occurrence of one of the following events that indicates Our intention to start delivering Your Order: Us or Our Partner sending You Correspondence stating that We, Our Partner, or Our agent are dispatching Goods to You; or Us sending You Correspondence stating that Goods are ready for You to collect from Us or Our agent

I suspect none of those things happened, so they hadn't accepted your order. So technically, they weren't cancelling your order, they just decided not to accept it. (Most online sellers have similar terms.)

Put another way, they were saying "We won't accept your order for £999, but you can submit another order for £1249, and we might accept that."

Shocking customer service, but legal under contract law.

(Their T&Cs: https://www.therange.co.uk/terms-and-conditions/)

You might have a basis for complaining to Trading Standards or the Advertising Standards Authority that the company has breached the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 because of misleading pricing and/or misleading information. If enough people complain about the same company, it might trigger an investigation. But that still wouldn't make them accept your order at £999.

Edit to add...

FWIW, I doubt the "partner" made any profit out of holding your £999. They would have paid bank transaction fees, and probably a fee to The Range for processing the transaction. So overall, they will probably have lost a little bit.

But maybe The Range keep the processing fee that they charge their "partner" - so maybe they made a few quid.

Pollycat · 13 June 2021 at 9:09AM

eddddy said:

A quick look at their website T&Cs - they say things like:
"Partner/Trusted Partner/Marketplace Partner" means our third-party sellers who have been invited to sell goods on Our Websites
So when their agent said the courier had cancelled the order - maybe they meant their "Partner" (or third party seller) cancelled it.

And...
"Order Acceptance Event" means the occurrence of one of the following events that indicates Our intention to start delivering Your Order: Us or Our Partner sending You Correspondence stating that We, Our Partner, or Our agent are dispatching Goods to You; or Us sending You Correspondence stating that Goods are ready for You to collect from Us or Our agent
I suspect none of those things happened, so they hadn't accepted your order. So technically, they weren't cancelling your order, they just decided not to accept it. (Most online sellers have similar terms.)

Put another way, they were saying "We won't accept your order for £999, but you can submit another order for £1249, and we might accept that."

Shocking customer service, but legal under contract law.
(Their T&Cs: https://www.therange.co.uk/terms-and-conditions/)

You might have a basis for complaining to Trading Standards or the Advertising Standards Authority that the company has breached the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 because of misleading pricing and/or misleading information. If enough people complain about the same company, it might trigger an investigation. But that still wouldn't make them accept your order at £999.

Edit to add...
FWIW, I doubt the "partner" made any profit out of holding your £999. They would have paid bank transaction fees, and probably a fee to The Range for processing the transaction. So overall, they will probably have lost a little bit.
But maybe The Range keep the processing fee that they charge their "partner".

According to The Range website:

Q.

When will you process the payment for my pre-order?

We’ll take the payment for your order as soon as you complete the checkout process. If you later change your mind or cancel your order before it’s dispatched, we’ll refund you in full.

https://www.therange.co.uk/faq/

so they would have taken the OP's money at the time of the order which was March 2021.

So wouldn't that mean they had accepted the order?

Al_Ross · 13 June 2021 at 9:22AM

I suspect the suppliers put their prices up, a shortage in materials, Covid etc, etc.

The Range weren’t going to be out of pocket, so cancelled your order and told the Op to re-order at the new price.

A poor way to treat a customer who had paid for the goods and had been waiting months, but they probably are within the law to do so.

Aylesbury_Duck · 13 June 2021 at 11:17AM

ThisnotThat said:

mattyprice4004 said:

ThisnotThat said:

born_again said:

Perhaps the range mean their courier has cancelled as they can not get the goods. As has been widely reports goods such as the OP are in very short supply. In many ways due to a boat getting stuck in the Suez canal as well as something called Covid 19.

OP take the money and say thank you range from saving me from the rubbish they sell.

And if you want to get your hands on it, the prices have been jacked up.

It's not ideal, but I can well understand The Range not being in a position to supply at the previous price if their costs have increased significantly.

They should honour the previous price - anything else is very poor service indeed.
If your costs are uncertain, don't sell on a pre-order basis. Only actual take money when you know what the goods will cost you for sure.

Let's be clear, their manufacturers are Chinese and don't care about breaking contracts, because no Mickey Mouse Chinese court would ever rule in favour of a foreign company against a Chinese one.

They've had the prices upped after they've ordered and they have no choice but to cancel the orders or ask for more money.

The solution to this problem is to stop doing business with China. You will always lose, eventually.

The solution is that people stop buying cheap unnecessary tat. Retailers will continue to source from China and elsewhere as long as there's an unending appetite for unreasonably cheap and consequently poor quality goods. I've lost count of the number of threads where people have ordered unfeasibly cheap garden furniture, heated adult paddling pools, chimeneas and the like and it's either not turned up, has turned up in pieces and with parts missing, or has fallen apart within three months.

Pollycat · 13 June 2021 at 11:35AM

Aylesbury_Duck said:

ThisnotThat said:

mattyprice4004 said:

ThisnotThat said:

born_again said:

Perhaps the range mean their courier has cancelled as they can not get the goods. As has been widely reports goods such as the OP are in very short supply. In many ways due to a boat getting stuck in the Suez canal as well as something called Covid 19.

OP take the money and say thank you range from saving me from the rubbish they sell.

And if you want to get your hands on it, the prices have been jacked up.

It's not ideal, but I can well understand The Range not being in a position to supply at the previous price if their costs have increased significantly.

They should honour the previous price - anything else is very poor service indeed.
If your costs are uncertain, don't sell on a pre-order basis. Only actual take money when you know what the goods will cost you for sure.

Let's be clear, their manufacturers are Chinese and don't care about breaking contracts, because no Mickey Mouse Chinese court would ever rule in favour of a foreign company against a Chinese one.

They've had the prices upped after they've ordered and they have no choice but to cancel the orders or ask for more money.

The solution to this problem is to stop doing business with China. You will always lose, eventually.

The solution is that people stop buying cheap unnecessary tat. Retailers will continue to source from China and elsewhere as long as there's an unending appetite for unreasonably cheap and consequently poor quality goods. I've lost count of the number of threads where people have ordered unfeasibly cheap garden furniture, heated adult paddling pools, chimeneas and the like and it's either not turned up, has turned up in pieces and with parts missing, or has fallen apart within three months.