Custom made vs create-on-demand - Consumer Contract Regulations

ginger_whiskers

I like T-shirts, however many T-shirts don't like me as I'm a bit on the short and rotund side. So, I make a point of checking returns when buying online as there's a chance I'll be making use of it.

Along with failing to point out they should return standard outward postage, or expressly saying they don't, my biggest gripe is that companies like to herald 'This product is printed just for you!' and say they can't refund it unless faulty.

The Consumer Contract Regulations quite reasonably say you can't return personalised or custom made items, but I feel companies are using this to get out of their obligations, what do you think?

Now say 'Cute Cat T-shirt' is standard design, can be bought by anyone, from their website, on any day. Just because they printed it just for my order (if that's even true?), it's NOT personalised, nor unique.

If I was sending a photo of my own cat (if I had one) to be put on a T-shirt, that would be a custom made product. No-one would likely want to buy that T-shirt, they couldn't resell it. That would, IMO, be custom and non-refundable.

To make matters worse, some site say they will exchange the product. What would be the point, if it was something they couldn't resell due to it being a custom item?

What are other people's thoughts on this? Am I right or wrong? The same applies not just to T-shirts of course, but anything similar like pictures.

Interested to see the replies!

Aylesbury_Duck

You're right, but I don't think I've ever seen anyone test it legally.

jon81uk

We had this discussion last week about the Adidas football shirts.

In my opinion the football shirts are being customised to order even if its players name.
But in this case where it is printed on demand it doesn't feel as clear because without the printing you'd have a plain shirt.

But I don't think its been clearly defined legally.

ginger_whiskers

I think the point here is that anyone can order that product. Just because a company chooses not to make some up in a batch and keep them on a shelf as stock, doesn't make them custom. It's just stock control. They may make and sell the same product for ten people an hour. It's NOT customised, just because they are having to print it.

user1977

As above - "customised" would be e.g. you sending them your picture of a cute cat, not just you picking from their set of options.

eskbanker

As mentioned above, this issue has been debated fairly extensively on another recent thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6407013/adidas-world-cup-shirts-dont-fit-advertised-size/p1

ginger_whiskers

eskbanker said:

As mentioned above, this issue has been debated fairly extensively on another recent thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6407013/adidas-world-cup-shirts-dont-fit-advertised-size/p1

I looked, but it's different. I'm not choosing anything to be added, the only option would be size. There is no personalisation here. No choices made.
The companies are using the fact they have to print them, that they are made-to-order ('custom'), as a reason to not accept returns., and I don't think that should be the case.

Aylesbury_Duck

ginger_whiskers said:

eskbanker said:

As mentioned above, this issue has been debated fairly extensively on another recent thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6407013/adidas-world-cup-shirts-dont-fit-advertised-size/p1

I looked, but it's different. I'm not choosing anything to be added, the only option would be size. There is no personalisation here. No choices made.
The companies are using the fact they have to print them, that they are made-to-order ('custom'), as a reason to not accept returns., and I don't think that should be the case.

You've got three options, then:

1. Don't buy from them because they're not prepared to honour their obligations.
2. Report them to Trading Standards, but I suspect they've got bigger fish to fry.
3. Buy from them, try a return and when they fail to accept it, put them through a chargeback action to demonstrate that they're wrong.

ginger_whiskers

Thanks, good advice.

tightauldgit

Legally I think we are all probably speculating because I don't think it's been tested in case law but my thinking is a lot of this comes down to what is the base product, what is the customisation and what is the impact on the retailer of the return. 

If something is made completely bespoke then I think that's a given but in these grey areas I'm minded to think that a football shirt there is a least a case to say the product is a plain football shirt and the customisation is the name and that is a specific enough product to possibly justify saying its customised. In the case you are talking about then what is the base product? A blank black shirt? But they don't sell blank black shirts do they? What they sell are printed shirts. So the base product is the shirt with a printed design on it. So what is the customisation step?  

Manxman_in_exile

tightauldgit said:

... So what is the customisation step?  

I'm not sure if this is hair-splitting, but it's not about "customisation".

It's about whether the product has been "personalised" for the consumer, or has been made to their "specification".

To me "personalised" means that the product has been altered in some way that connects it directly to that individual consumer.  So in the case of football shirts for example, selecting Messi from a drop down list for an Argentine national shirt is not personalising that shirt for anybody (except possibly Messi!) but asking it to be printed with "Manxman in exile" together with my birth date would be personalisation.

A t-shirt (or football shirt) would be made to the consumer's specification if the consumer specified something outside the scope of what the seller sold.  eg the consumer specified a different or unusual cut or style for the shirt, or they specified a material that was not normally used, or they specified some unusual pattern of football shirt that didn't already exist.

That's what I understand by "personalisation" and the consumer's own "specification"

And yes, you can say that personalised items or items made to the customer's specification are "customised", but I don't think that means that all "customised" items are necessarily either personalised or made to the customers specification.

That's how I view it anyway.