Taking A Company to court but still need tech support from them

p4dstar

I paid a company to fit some equipment to my van. On the same order I also ordered parts and consumables. The parts and consumables were never received and a refund wast given. The order was paid for last March and after giving several ultimatums I had to open a money claim with the court. I have pretty clear cut evidence in the form of emails that they owe the money.

I have some technical problems with the equipment they fitted to my van. Before I took them to court for the monies owed they were providing tech support and the items are in warranty. Once court proceedings were opened they have started to ignore me. They refuse my phone calls because I am going down the legal route. Are there any issues with me continuing to contact them regarding tech support on other items after opening up a county court case?

Secondary to this, some of the items I need tech support on are from the same order as the items I am taking them to court for. They were paid for with a credit card and all of these items are over £100. There were 2 further items at circa £1k each from a previous order, still under warranty, paid for on a credit card, that are faulty.

They have waited until the afternoon of the final day to respond to the courts and requested a further 14 days which has been granted. I thought I better seek advice before doing anything further. One of the faulty items allows diesel fumes to return into the van and is particularly dangerous so I don't want to leave it any longer than I need to.

Alderbank

You have been very unlucky with all these separate problems from one supplier!

• Is this a consumer issue or B2B?
• What are the various parts, consumables equipment and 'items' you talk about?
• In view of the complexity, a timeline would be really useful, listing sequentially and giving date for each consecutive event. I realise this will be a long list.

Diesel fumes returning into the van? Regardless of the court case, absolutely your responsibility not to use at all until fixed, however long it takes

p4dstar

Alderbank said:

You have been very unlucky with all these separate problems from one supplier!

• Is this a consumer issue or B2B?
• What are the various parts, consumables equipment and 'items' you talk about?
• In view of the complexity, a timeline would be really useful, listing sequentially and giving date for each consecutive event. I realise this will be a long list.

Diesel fumes returning into the van? Regardless of the court case, absolutely your responsibility not to use at all until fixed, however long it takes

Thanks for getting back to me Alderbank. I originally wrote quite a detailed post but removed it as I'm not sure what I am allowed to post publicly. I'm sure I am fine if I don't name them etc.

This is a business to business transaction. I was a sole trader at the time of ordering though. My business is a window cleaning company and the supplier originally supplied me with a window cleaning system. I bought a second one for another van, then went back to them for some reels for the first van.

Last March I paid for an upgrade that included a Webasto heater for my first van. This was installed in June-July. There were a lot of problems but going through every one doesn't seem relevant. The actual installation was not completed in full, when I collected the van they had to agree to come out to me and finish off the work. They didn't have the consumables and parts ready and agreed to bring them when they finished off the install. They didn't bring the consumables & some of the parts. They also advised it best not to fit some parts. The total value of the parts and consumables is nearly £500.

There have been a handful of technical issues with the system. The leisure batteries supplied are failing. The diesel heater has an exhaust pointing at some roller guides and the rear of the van fills with unfiltered diesel. To explain, this only happens when the vehicle is stopped, the doors are open and there is a bulk head between the back and cab. Issues then began with the reels ordered the year before this but still under a 2 year warranty.

For the months after the install I had an ongoing dialogue with the customer services where they would provide support and detail what needed to be done. They have openly written about items owed and monies owed. Then nothing gets resolved and I start again. At the very end of November I advised if they didn't send the missing items and provide a credit or refund for the others I would be taking them to court. At this point customer services refused to speak to me. They gave me an email address for senior management and said all correspondence must be in writing. I wrote in and didn't get a response in December.

I sought advice from my credit card company who sent me back to them to see if I could get a resolution. I emailed again at the beginning of January and gave them a final ultimatum. They responded and started to provide tech support for the faulty items. I made it clear I no longer wanted the items outstanding and instead wanted a refund. Rather bizarrely they accused me of issuing a chargeback. This seems like complete gas lighting, I even had to call my credit card company and confirm. They advised it wasn't possible to charge back after 4 months. They ignored anything I said about this but continued to talk about the technical problems.

They agreed they need to send an engineer for some issues. They agreed to look at other issues but kept saying if it was found there is no fault I am liable for an engineer call out. I told them I didn't accept these additional terms. They told me they were standard and written in the user manual for the systems. So that is in the manual that you should receive when you have already bought the system. As I told them I have never received one of these manuals. I left this point by pointing out the engineer would already be there for the items they have agreed need to be fixed so a call out fee wouldn't be appropriate and that I simply don't accept "additional terms". If these terms were already in place I don't see why they need to be specifically mentioned in the email.

As they were ignoring my questions about the refund for the missing items I said I would treat them as two issues. Gave them a further few days to resolve the missing items or provide evidence of chargeback. When this wasn't received I applied to the courts. They have ignored my emails about tech support. They waited until the final hour on the final day to respond and requested a further 14 days.

pramsay13

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

p4dstar

pramsay13 said:

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

The items are under warranty. How can a company just decide not to provide support on items under warranty? I would accept a refund if they didn't want to provide tech support. I have made this clear to them.

powerful_Rogue

p4dstar said:

pramsay13 said:

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

The items are under warranty. How can a company just decide not to provide support on items under warranty? I would accept a refund if they didn't want to provide tech support. I have made this clear to them.

What are the terms of the warranty? Does the warranty apply to business purchases?

Alderbank

You, or your legal advisors, need to look carefully at the T&Cs of the contract you agreed to. As a B2B transaction you do not have any of the additional rights granted to consumers under consumer laws.

When the supplier company have submitted their defence to the court (you will receive a copy of this) the judge will read each of your claims and their defence to that claim, one by one, and decide on the balance of probabilities whether each claim stands or fails. Very occasionally he might ask the parties for further information but that is not common for small claims.

For each claim he finds in your favour he will order the company to repay you. This might be the amount you have requested in your claim or he might reduce it for reasons he will state.
Recompense to you will be money. He will not order specific performance, i.e. he will not say they must provide technical support but he will say they must recompense you a specific sum for failing to provide the expected level of technical advice.

The court itself will not pay you any damages you are awarded. Ideally the company will pay you the award at this point. If it does not, you will have to take further measures which you will have to pay for.

p4dstar

powerful_Rogue said:

p4dstar said:

pramsay13 said:

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

The items are under warranty. How can a company just decide not to provide support on items under warranty? I would accept a refund if they didn't want to provide tech support. I have made this clear to them.

What are the terms of the warranty? Does the warranty apply to business purchases?

I haven’t been provided with any further information other than ‘2 year warranty’. I haven’t signed or agreed to any terms to be honest. They are solely a B2B company. Domestic customers don’t purchase £10k worth of kit to clean their own windows.

The point I made above about being a sole trader was specifically relevant to issuing a section 75 on the faulty items.

p4dstar

Alderbank said:

You, or your legal advisors, need to look carefully at the T&Cs of the contract you agreed to. As a B2B transaction you do not have any of the additional rights granted to consumers under consumer laws.

When the supplier company have submitted their defence to the court (you will receive a copy of this) the judge will read each of your claims and their defence to that claim, one by one, and decide on the balance of probabilities whether each claim stands or fails. Very occasionally he might ask the parties for further information but that is not common for small claims.

For each claim he finds in your favour he will order the company to repay you. This might be the amount you have requested in your claim or he might reduce it for reasons he will state.
Recompense to you will be money. He will not order specific performance, i.e. he will not say they must provide technical support but he will say they must recompense you a specific sum for failing to provide the expected level of technical advice.

The court itself will not pay you any damages you are awarded. Ideally the company will pay you the award at this point. If it does not, you will have to take further measures which you will have to pay for.

Thanks Alderbank. I’m not sure if I’ve explained it properly. The court action is for just under £500. This is for goods not received and a refund not given. I have emails from the company and it’s pretty black and white. Their only defence to me has been to accuse me of charging back the monies. This is untrue and impossible, my card company confirmed this. I would accept whatever the judge decides on this but be baffled if it wasn’t to offer a full refund.

Secondary to this I still have faulty items. They are within their warranty period and they were sending emails back and forth discussing prior to court action for the other issue.

I guess my main questions at this point are;

- Are we obliged to cease contact once proceedings are opened (this would explain why they’ve ignored me) and would there be any issue with the fact I have contacted them about a different issue.

- With the faulty items I’m protected by section 75 as I paid on my card. Is this protection in anyway affected by the court case as these items were on the same order.

- If the courts settle this case is it possible to open another case for different items (on the same order) if required.

tacpot12

pramsay13 said:

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

I think the OP is talking about warranty support rather than "technical support". What's the difference? My view is that "warranty support" isn't something you pay for as a seperate line item on an invoice (it's included in the purchase), whereas "technical support" is something that you can pay for AFTER the warranty period has ended.

Where a product has been supplied and installed, it would be expected to work within the warranty period provided by the product manufacturer, and the warranty period provided by the installer. These periods can be different, and it is not unusual for the warranty period provided by the installer to be much shorted because the operational environemnt where the installed products are used can be too variable for them to want to commit to a long period.

I would say that the do have to provide the warranty support that the offered the OP when he placed his order. They also have to provide the product warranty support for as long as the product warrant is provided by the manufacturer OR refund the purchase price of the products (less a deduction for wear and tear). 

I think the OP has done exactly the right think, and just needs to get the senior management at the supplier to understand their obligations. Taking them to court seems the correct action given the sums involved, and they can't not provide warranty support that the OP purchased with the installation and with the products. The judge should be clear on this.   

tightauldgit

pramsay13 said:

They don't have to provide tech support to you if they don't want to. If the support is something you have paid for they should refund but otherwise you can't force them. 

I don't think that's right. They have a contractual obligation to provide whatever support is set out in their terms. In this case it would appear the item is faulty or improperly installed and I don't think you can just partial refund out of the obligation to provide something that is fit for purpose and safe to use.

Of course they have no obligation to go over and above whatever contractual minimum or be nice to you or go out of their way to be helpful. 

To my mind though this is all part of the same issue and would probably best be addressed by the court. Whether the existing case can be amended to include these further issues I'm not sure.