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Adidas World Cup Shirts Don't fit Advertised Size
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MoneySavingExpert
Chair, Martin Lewis · Editor, Marcus Herbert
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Again, I think that if you asked most people if having an item made to order with a name on the back they would not see any difference between selecting the name of a professional player or choosing an alternative. The item is still being customised to order at the customers specification.
Clearly their free text box entry isnt going to have many No 13 - DullGreyGuy sitting on the shelf ready for people to order.
The size 9-10 years fits my 8 year old (Sept Birthday) perfectly.
It would not fit any 10 year old I know.
Adidas still refusing to accept refunds.
Now the interesting thing here is I don't know when you are buying direct from a manufacturer how the thing works. I suspect that Adidas UK or Europe or whatever are buying non-named shirts from Adidas Global or from a third party manufacturer and adding the names themselves. Which would make it the same as buying from a sports shop. I doubt that Adidas pre-order X number of shirts with Messi - that's going to be a very tricky process to manage. Say for example, that Adidas got 100,000 PSG shirts with Messi printed on them and then he's sold to AC Milan the next day.
If you're arguing that Adidas should accept returns of shirts with names on them then at the very least that's putting a burden back on Adidas to be able to manage that process which seems unfair to some extent.
Which of course doesn't negate the size potentially being wrong - which very much is an Adidas issue if true.
The consideration you mention for the retailer being "out of pocket" is simplistic, they will already be out of pocket anyway as the whole idea of change of mind returns costs them money, not just loss of profit but cost of staff to pack, etc and a courier to deliver which they won't get back.
The intention of the regs appears to be that if you sell a product and the customer returns it you can sell it to someone else.
If it's custom then the odds of someone else buying it are slim so these things are exempt to save the trader from exceptional hardship.
However if the so-called customisation is a dropdown menu choice then it is likely someone else will order the same goods and the burden of being lumbered with something that won't sell again is reduced. Retailers offering choice via drop down don't have obscure choices that will apply to one customer. It is a way for them to vary choice beyond 1 but equally limit it to less than everything.
Of course you could have dropdown options that result in thousands of combinations but that would be for the benefit of the trader to increase their sales and in doing so they bear the risk of having to accept a return on a combination that isn't popular.
I've just looked on their site and I've selected the men's Argentina home 2022 world cup shirt and I've selected Messi's name and number from a drop down box. (Only XL size still available)
Did you follow the same process? ie you slected a team, selected a shirt, and then selected a player's name from a drop down list? Or did you type in a name? (I note that some of the club shirts don't have a drop down option for a player name and you have to type a name in).
I would still argue (as I did in my earlier posts) that if you are selecting the name of an existing player (eg Messi for Argentina) from a list of options provided by Adidas in a drop down box, then you are neither personalising the shirt nor asking for it to be produced to your own specifications. The shirt is clearly not "personal" to you and although it is printed with a name selected by you, the name is one provided by Adidas as an option.
Yes - when you are making your name selection Adidas do claim that you are "personalising" your shirt, but just because they say so doesn't make it true!
So long as you selected the name from a list of options provided by Adidas, the shirts are neither personalised nor made to your specifications. You really need to go back and argue this point with them.
(Again it would be helpful to know what shirt you ordered and what player's name)
According to Adidas' T&Cs (posted previously by @sheramber) if you wanted to go to court you'd have to do it in the Netherlands...
But 2.14 of their T&Cs confirms that your statutory rights in this country remain unaffected, and 2.14 actually reflects almost exactly the cancellation provisons of Part 3 of The Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 (legislation.gov.uk).
If Adidas remain intransigent I'd initiate a chargeback* with my bank if I were you. Point out to your bank that Adidas are simply wrong in claiming that selecting a name from a drop down field that they've populated themselves "personalises" the product. It does not!
*I'm assuming you would be unable to make a s75 claim as each of the shirts is < £100?.
(Again - apologies if you didn't pay by card and I've missed that fact. Edit: I see you paid by debit card, but I suppose the question is whether a chargeback applies in this sort of situation. Possibly not...)