Small Claims for Wedding services not received

Philip_Jackman

diego_94 said:

Philip_Jackman said:

Thanks for your comments. My daughter has now had a reply from the hair and makeup stylist. As my claim against her was dismissed she now considers that she owe neither myself nor my daughter any refund, 0%. A big thankyou to the legal system for completely undermining any and all consumer rights.

Sorry for saying this, but its not the legal system that is the problem here, unfortunately it is you. You cancelled the contract, yet you want a full refund? I think both parties were very reasonable to you when they didnt have to be, and now you are paying the price. If I were them I would do exactly what the make up artist has done and now offer you nothing.

Neither my daughter nor I conceleed the contract. The contract was 'frustrated' by covid. This means that the contract was effectively cancelled by forces outside of the control of either party. The CMA guidance available online to wedding contracts frustrated by covid state that the parties should be returned to the state prior to the contract being accepted.

Debbie9009

In this case the wedding couldn’t go ahead due to your daughter and her husband testing positive for covid, the CMA guidance refers specifically to cancellations due to lockdown rules not cancellations due to someone having covid, so that guidance doesn’t apply to what happened here. 

They might have been happy to provide the services at a rescheduled date, but it sounds as though when the wedding was changed due to not being able to get the church and registry office on the same day, the decision was made to not use them, so again this is not due to lockdown rules.  Did anyone discuss with the service providers at the time if their services could have been used in a different way ? 

The reality here is that you refused good offers from the florist and make up person, and instead chose to take them to court costing them time and money, so it’s really not surprising that the make up person has withdrawn their offer. If the court makes the same decision with the florist then I would think that they will also withdraw their offer.

sheramber

Philip_Jackman said:

diego_94 said:

Philip_Jackman said:

Thanks for your comments. My daughter has now had a reply from the hair and makeup stylist. As my claim against her was dismissed she now considers that she owe neither myself nor my daughter any refund, 0%. A big thankyou to the legal system for completely undermining any and all consumer rights.

Sorry for saying this, but its not the legal system that is the problem here, unfortunately it is you. You cancelled the contract, yet you want a full refund? I think both parties were very reasonable to you when they didnt have to be, and now you are paying the price. If I were them I would do exactly what the make up artist has done and now offer you nothing.

Neither my daughter nor I conceleed the contract. The contract was 'frustrated' by covid. This means that the contract was effectively cancelled by forces outside of the control of either party. The CMA guidance available online to wedding contracts frustrated by covid state that the parties should be returned to the state prior to the contract being accepted.

Would you expect a refund if they had got Measles or Chickenpox  or flu, rather than Covid?

Covid is no longer considered any more than flu as an illness. It is not a notifiable disease and you are not legally required to stay off work or isolate,  if you  contract it. 

Wedding Insiurance may  have been the route for a claim, if they had taken it out.

Okell

Philip_Jackman said:

diego_94 said:

Philip_Jackman said:

Thanks for your comments. My daughter has now had a reply from the hair and makeup stylist. As my claim against her was dismissed she now considers that she owe neither myself nor my daughter any refund, 0%. A big thankyou to the legal system for completely undermining any and all consumer rights.

Sorry for saying this, but its not the legal system that is the problem here, unfortunately it is you. You cancelled the contract, yet you want a full refund? I think both parties were very reasonable to you when they didnt have to be, and now you are paying the price. If I were them I would do exactly what the make up artist has done and now offer you nothing.

Neither my daughter nor I conceleed the contract. The contract was 'frustrated' by covid. This means that the contract was effectively cancelled by forces outside of the control of either party. The CMA guidance available online to wedding contracts frustrated by covid state that the parties should be returned to the state prior to the contract being accepted.

No.

When I first read your opening post I thought it was a case of frustration too, but @Debbie9009 is correct - it isn't.**

Upon re-reading both your first post and the CMA guidance, it seems that the make-up and flower contracts were not frustrated because of lockdown restrictions**, they simply didn't go ahead because your daughter and son-in-law unilaterally decided not to go ahead as planned, and instead "... they opted to cancel the church wedding and settle for a simpler registry office wedding in a different city. The original wedding was due to be held in Maldon, Essex, and the registry office wedding was held in York."

By having entered into contracts to buy (1) a make-up service, and (2) the provision of flowers for a church wedding in Essex, your daughter and son-in-law effectively cancelled those contracts by cancelling the church wedding for which they were required.  Those contracts weren't frustrated by Covid.  They were cancelled when the decision was made to cancel the church wedding.

The reason the make-up service and flowers were no longer needed was not because of Covid, it was because of the decision to cancel the church service.

What your daughter should have done before deciding to cancel the church service was to check the T&Cs of the other two contracts to see what the knock-on effects of cancelling the church service would have been.  It seems you didn't bother to do so and just assumed you would get your money back.  That was a mistake.

What did you base your Particulars of Claim on?  If they were based on frustration of contract then I think your claim would have been thrown out anyway, even if your daughter had been the claimant.  The contracts weren't frustrated.  You, or your daughter, effectively cancelled them.

However, all that doesn't necessarily mean that you (or your daughter) don't have a claim on other grounds that might be valid.  It depends on what the T&Cs for the two contrcats say about your right to cancel and what the timescales for cancellation are.  But I can't read them from here...

If you do want to pursue this further I'd suggest you do what @the_lunatic_is_in_my_head advised and try CAB and/or see if they can direct you to a solicitor who is willing to provide 30 mins free advice.

And/or you could try asking on the Consumer Action Group forum or Legal Beagles forum.  They tend to be more focused on the civil procedure rules and assisting litigants in person.

Even if you go to CAB or the other consumer help forums I suspect you'll be wasting your time.  Unfortunately you seem to have approached this in a cack-handed manner from the outset.  It's now up to you to decide if it's worth it.

(That's not intended as a criticism of you.  The small claims court is a bit of a minefield and the court system basically assumes that you know what you are doing.  If you don't, it might not end well...)


**It might be that the contracts were frustrated by Covid lockdowns, but the way you've told the story so far suggests that they weren't.  It was the voluntary decision by your daughter etc to cancel the church wedding that caused the problem

Undervalued

Philip_Jackman said:

Thanks for your comments. My daughter has now had a reply from the hair and makeup stylist. As my claim against her was dismissed she now considers that she owe neither myself nor my daughter any refund, 0%. A big thankyou to the legal system for completely undermining any and all consumer rights.

There is a saying "A man who is his own advocate has a fool for his client".

Joking apart, although small claims are frequently conducted by a litigant in person, at the very least I think that saying applies to your appeal!

born_again

When you look at the refunds & the effect that 2020 & 2021 had on these types of retailer. They really did offer very good refunds.

pinkshoes

Philip_Jackman said:

Neither my daughter nor I conceleed the contract. The contract was 'frustrated' by covid. This means that the contract was effectively cancelled by forces outside of the control of either party. The CMA guidance available online to wedding contracts frustrated by covid state that the parties should be returned to the state prior to the contract being accepted.

The florist and hair stylist were both still available though. They didn't have Covid.

Under consumer rights they needed to mitigate their loses which they both did and hence you got offered a partial refund.

The only way to get all your expenses back would have been to take out wedding insurance which covered scenarios such as this.

diego_94

Philip_Jackman said:

diego_94 said:

Philip_Jackman said:

Thanks for your comments. My daughter has now had a reply from the hair and makeup stylist. As my claim against her was dismissed she now considers that she owe neither myself nor my daughter any refund, 0%. A big thankyou to the legal system for completely undermining any and all consumer rights.

Sorry for saying this, but its not the legal system that is the problem here, unfortunately it is you. You cancelled the contract, yet you want a full refund? I think both parties were very reasonable to you when they didnt have to be, and now you are paying the price. If I were them I would do exactly what the make up artist has done and now offer you nothing.

Neither my daughter nor I conceleed the contract. The contract was 'frustrated' by covid. This means that the contract was effectively cancelled by forces outside of the control of either party. The CMA guidance available online to wedding contracts frustrated by covid state that the parties should be returned to the state prior to the contract being accepted.

You’re really clutching at straws now. Advice is to accept the offer from the florist and walk away. If it goes to court and you loose (which you will), all offers will be withdrawn. And rightly so