A company refuses to refund us £545 after having sent the goods back

lucinka77

Jenni_D said:

400kg!!!! 😲 How big was this kennel? How big is your dog?

Edit: I have a 7' x 5' wooden fence in the garden, and even with the wooden ground support frame I doubt it weighs 400kg.

As mentioned above, a phone sale is still a remote (distance) sale, so in normal circumstances you can cancel the contract without charge (other than perhaps be liable for the cost of returning the goods - with caveats as to if/how the contractual T&Cs were notified). If the goods were customised then the "cancel for no reason" right is usually removed - but it still depends on if/how the contractual T&Cs were notified.

Thank you, Jenni. We definitely didn't cancel for no reason, the reason was that this 400kg XL kennel was sitting in front of our neighbour's drive, and she had just returned from work and could not get in. It was a highly stressful situation for everyone involved, the lorry was blocking our narrow lane, cars who couldn't get through it were honking...a terrible situation. 

The dimensions were: 1397mm Length, 914mm Width, and 965mm Height. Our neigbours' garden gate is 890 mm wide, so this was of our primary concern, since it's clearly narrower than the kennel's width. However, as she insisted that a crew of two men should be able to deliver it to our garden, we decided to go for it.

We were in disbelief about the 400kg weight, which was only revealed to us after the delivery (with a single driver, who could not believe his eyes either. He was from a separate delivery company, not an employee of this company.)

And we were happy to pay the £60 return fee, as discussed with the sales team. But the company keeps insisting tthat we read 'read their terms and conditions about non-refundable custom-made items', and so far have not commented on any of our points mentioned in this forum. 

Aylesbury_Duck

Why can't the fence and gate be removed to widen the opening, or is it a brick wall?

nyermen

Well they certainly can't claim that "rejecting delivery" (especially when they couldn't deliver to what was agreed) means they get to keep the goods and the payment.

As Jenni_D has said - how did you pay?  You should probably start a card claim (eg. chargeback/S75) since by what they've said, they've closed the conversation from their side.  Was it by email?  Make sure you keep a copy just in case, and be clear to the card company that delivery conditions were changed and impossible to accept. Also, no T&C and it would seem no proper indication this was bespoke?

Ps. A lot of flagging of poor trustpilot reviews... https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.cherryacresanimalhousing.co.uk/transparency

lucinka77

Aylesbury_Duck said:

Putting rights to one side, and assuming you still need the kennel, is there a practical solution, e.g. temporarily removing your neighbour's fence (with their agreement, of course) to widen the opening, or are we talking about brick walls?

Thank you. The fence is wooden, but not easily removable. I think it would be possible to have a slightly smaller kennel, size Large, (instead of XL) with 736mm width that should pass through the 890mm gate. Our dog is a German Shepherd, pretty large, so we eventually opted for the XL size.

But now I regret we did not go for our original plan, the Large size. When we discussed this with the sales team, they told us that the builders say German Shepherd should definitely have an XL size, so we said yes to it, and I think that was a mistake.

 I don't think they would send us another one now, as they said they're not obliged to send us a replacement (because we refused delivery of an item marked by the driver as 'in perfect condition' - but obviously  not in a condition to be received by us..!)

Aylesbury_Duck

lucinka77 said:

Aylesbury_Duck said:

Putting rights to one side, and assuming you still need the kennel, is there a practical solution, e.g. temporarily removing your neighbour's fence (with their agreement, of course) to widen the opening, or are we talking about brick walls?

Thank you. The fence is wooden, but not easily removable. I think it would be possible to have a slightly smaller kennel, size Large, (instead of XL) with 736mm width that should pass through the 890mm gate. Our dog is a German Shepherd, pretty large, so we eventually opted for the XL size.

But now I regret we did not go for our original plan, the Large size. When we discussed this with the sales team, they told us that the builders say German Shepherd should definitely have an XL size, so we said yes to it, and I think that was a mistake.

 I don't think they would send us another one now, as they said they're not obliged to send us a replacement (because we refused delivery of an item marked by the driver as 'in perfect condition' - but obviously  not in a condition to be received by us..!)

I think it comes down to this: do you want the kennel you ordered, or not?  If you do, it seems there's a practical way to get it delivered, by removing the fence temporarily, assuming your neighbour consents.  If you don't, then others have given practical steps as to how you might limit your losses, but you still need a kennel.  It seems backward to order a kennel of a size to fit a gate rather than the size that your dog needs.

Nannytone

The weight has to be an error.
Probably 40 kg ( 6.2 stones) and not 400 kg (62.9 stones)

Alderbank

lucinka77 said:

Thank you. The name of the company is Cherry Acres Animal Housing. Regarding another chance of re-delivery, they said in their email that since we have refused delivery of an item in 'perfect condition', they are not obliged to either give us a refund, or a replacement..! 

The 400kg was the primary reason why it was impossible to get it into our garden. The sales rep clearly didn't know this when promising us two men to 'lift it through the gate if necessary. I would have thought it is the company's responsibility to train their sales team properly.  
And even after requesting the door, the sales rep said a return for £60 would be possible in case of any problems with the access.

Thanks for the link. It looks a good company I can see why you chose one of their products.
Their T&Cs say:

All housing as standard is delivered and built by our own drivers, working in this manner we can assure all of our products are built to the exact same standard as they were in the workshop.

They seem to have failed to meet their own T&Cs here.

The way I read it, the sales assistant assumed the kennel would be delivered in component for strapped to a pallet, as per their normal practice. The two men would unload the pallet with a pallet truck, wheel it to your gate, cut the strapping and carry each component through the gate to the assembly location. The lone driver was unable or unwilling to do this.

They might claim that it was a non-standard bespoke item so had to be delivered fully built. If so however there was a clear breakdown in communication both to you and their staff and also the contract might be void because of frustration (i.e. it is not possible to get a built kennel into your garden).

Lucinka, if you still want it, as I suppose you do because it is exactly what you ordered, I would call them and make clear what actually took place and they have not yet complied with contract but you are willing to allow them to return with the disassembled kennel for them to build 'to the exact same standard as they were in the workshop.'

If you no longer wish to deal with them you have a number of grounds including the poor business practice of sending no documentation to reject the contract.

DB1904

Nannytone said:

The weight has to be an error.
Probably 40 kg ( 6.2 stones) and not 400 kg (62.9 stones)

So with enough people could be lifted over the fence. 

born_again

So this is a The Albany Dog Cabin then?
Looks very solid & all sizes are on the website once you pick your size.

Still would not seem to be 62 stone in real weight...

Manxman_in_exile

Nannytone said:

The weight has to be an error.
Probably 40 kg ( 6.2 stones) and not 400 kg (62.9 stones)

It must be an error.  if it's 1.4m long and just under a metre in both width and height - leaving enough room inside for a German Shepherd - it can't possibly weigh over 880 lbs (nearly half a ton), can it?  It would need a reinforced concrete floor and the insulation would need to be 6" thick lead - a nuclear bunker!!!

DB1904 said:

Nannytone said:

The weight has to be an error.
Probably 40 kg ( 6.2 stones) and not 400 kg (62.9 stones)

So with enough people could be lifted over the fence. 

If 40kg yeah - but we're only guessing 40kg.  Whilst 400kg must (? ?) be too heavy, 40kg sounds a bit light to me.

If the firm's website doesn't specify the weight, how does the OP know it?  I presume the delivery documentation that the driver had must have had a weight on it.  If I were the OP I'd want to clarify with the supplier what the weight definitely is.  If it's nowhere near 400kg there might be an easier solution than fence removal.

[Edit:  And if the original delivery was refused because the supplier had somehow got the wrong weight on the documentation and it could have been delivered if the weight had been specified correctly, then I'd tell the supplier it's their responsibilty - and at their cost - to redeliver it]

Also - has the OP confirmed they were never given T&Cs or haven't they said?  It's not clear to me if they never got T&Cs or they did but never read them]