Blatant Sony breach of contract

Aylesbury_Duck

born_again said:

3. Agreement, Registration and the Service Period
 3.1 This Agreement and the provision of Support Services only apply if You are receiving the Support Services in the course of a business.
3.2 In order for the Support Services to be delivered Registration must be completed. For the avoidance of doubt, this Agreement is therefore not binding on either party until Registration has been completed.
3.3 We will treat Registration by You as your agreement to the provision of the Support Services on the terms of this Agreement and confirmation that You are receiving the Support Services in the course of a business and are not acting as a consumer

Which perhaps makes the thread title unfair and misleading, given that it seem that it's OP who's breached the contract with Sony.

cx6

Sony will 'target' .. ie not promise

DreamweaverB

Manxman_in_exile said:

"3.1 This Agreement and the provision of Support Services only apply if You are receiving the Support Services in the course of a business."

Did you tick anything at any stage to say you had read and understood* the T&Cs?  Or when you talk about "Sony Prime Support", do you mean some other support package that Sony provide?

born_again said:

3.3 We will treat Registration by You as your agreement to the provision of the Support Services on the terms of this Agreement and confirmation that You are receiving the Support Services in the course of a business and are not acting as a consumer

Well found to both of you however no I did not tick anything to say I agreed to those terms and I had not seen them before. 

The support registration form I completed was a one page hard-copy paper form (anyone remember those? lol) sent to me by the retailer which I completed, signed, scanned and emailed to Sony along with a copy of my invoice. Sony then emailed me back confirmation of my PrimeSupport registration.

At no point was I asked was I a business. Not for this repair but for the original fault 11 months ago (which is when I was asked to complete the PrimeSupport form) I was asked "if I was an end-user to please provide us with your address" which I did and they replaced the faulty unit.

The PrimeSupport form did ask for a company name (as many standard forms do as part of the address) and I left that blank. So as far as I am concerned it was perfectly clear to everyone that I was a consumer not a business. 

At no point during the purchase was there anything to check/ask whether I was a business or suggest the offer was only for businesses (and I used the same consumer retailer account I've used for years to buy all my AV equipment.)

I bought "Sony VPL-VW590ES (Black) (Inc. 5 Years Prime Support)" from the retailer and the retailer supplied the registration form which had stickers on with serial numbers for my specific support package. The price was for both the projector and support and the projector was available elsewhere for less money.

I can see where you are coming from with possibly being due a refund just of the support package if Sony say I am not eligible for the loan units. But if that was the case I would rather return the projector as well and receive a refund for both - it does not seem right that a retailer can supply a bundle and then cherry pick which parts to refund if one part was in error.

DreamweaverB

Aylesbury_Duck said:

born_again said:

3.3 We will treat Registration by You as your agreement to the provision of the Support Services on the terms of this Agreement and confirmation that You are receiving the Support Services in the course of a business and are not acting as a consumer

Which perhaps makes the thread title unfair and misleading, given that it seem that it's OP who's breached the contract with Sony.

I have since clarified that this term is not something I was made aware of or agreed to and has only come to light now some 11 months after Sony confirmed my registration was complete. I cannot be in breach of something I never agreed to...

cx6 said:

Sony will 'target' .. ie not promise

Yes, the context being "We target to despatch the loan unit the same day" not "We target to despatch a loan unit if we can". 

I cannot believe if this ended up in court that Sony could successfully argue they never promised to despatch a loan unit! Especially as their agent specifically told me they would despatch a loan unit once they diagnosed the faulty unit.

Manxman_in_exile

If you are 100% confident that (1) you did not at any time represent yourself as a business user, (2) that the retailer never told you that you were only eligible for PrimeSupport if you were a business user, and (3) that you never signed or did anything indicating that you had read and understood the terms that born_again and I have referred to above, then you should go back to the retailer and tell them that they mis-sold you the package. 

Say that you would never have bought it if you had known that you were not eligible for PrimeSupport.  You want a full refund.  I suspect the retailer will want to reduce the refund to reflect the use you were able to get from the product.  Obviously you will have to return the product.

Or, if you want to keep the product, you could try to negotiate a refund equivalent to the value of PrimeSupport for mis-selling it to you.

I think it's the retailer you have an issue with - not Sony.

DreamweaverB

Manxman_in_exile said:

If you are 100% confident that (1) you did not at any time represent yourself as a business user, (2) that the retailer never told you that you were only eligible for PrimeSupport if you were a business user, and (3) that you never signed or did anything indicating that you had read and understood the terms that born_again and I have referred to above, then you should go back to the retailer and tell them that they mis-sold you the package. 

Yes, I'm 100% certain of all those things. 

I feel bad for the retailer as it's Sony who didn't honour what they agreed with me but it is what it is.

To be absolutely clear, Sony haven't said they wouldn't supply a loan unit, they simply dillydallied for long enough that the repaired unit was finally returned to me first.

Jenni_D

I've read through the thread and I'm not sure the OP has answered the question - Did you buy it direct from Sony?

Manxman_in_exile

He bought it from his "favourite High street AV specialist".  (Sony or not I don't know).

The retailer advertised it as including Primesupport.

DreamweaverB

Jenni_D said:

I've read through the thread and I'm not sure the OP has answered the question - Did you buy it direct from Sony?

No not directly from Sony it was from an independent chain of High Street AV specialists.

Ergates

Regardless of what Sony did or didn't do - your support contract with them was void.  Don't feel bad for the retailer - they mis-sold you a support contract that was void the minute you signed it.  Maybe they thought they'd made it clear that this was a b2b offer, or maybe they just didn't know.