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View Full Version : Mail order - what to do


Blue_SV650S
13-01-07, 02:15 PM
Ok, I phoned this place up and ordered this part over the phone (a minimoto rear tyre).

http://www.funbikes.co.uk/Products/ViewProduct.aspx?Product=253

Got the tyre fine today, but it is not like the one in the picture (it blatantly obvious as the tread pattern is totally different, its has groves not 'blocks'). This is no use to me as I need one like in the pic as that is a direct replacement for the one I am replacing and it needs to match the front.

Now bearing in mind they have sent me an item that is not only not as pictured, they don't even show it as a tyre they sell (not a simple put the wrong tyre in there error) where do I stand??

Now look at their returns policy:- http://www.funbikes.co.uk/trading.aspx

I have weighed the tyre, and looked up postage costs. It will cost £4.75 to post it back to them.

According to their returns policy they will refund the cost of the tyre, but take out the postage cost. Bearing in mind thats £19 for the tyre (inc p&P), plus £5 in postage I am set to fork out £24 and only get £14 back ... so basically loosing a tenner for their mistake ...

Even if they sent me a tyre like in the pic for no extra cost, it's still going to cost me the £5 to post this one back ... I think their f-up, their duty to sort it at no cost to me ... i.e. they refund my £5 return postage cost AND send me the correct tyre for no extra cost .... but I don't think it is going to work like that .... (read below) ...

This smallprint on the returns page :-
Pricing and Print Errors
Prices and specifications are checked to the best of our ability, and whilst every effort has been made to make them accurate, no responsibility will be accepted for errors and omissions. We reserve the right to alter our prices and specifications without notice.

So basically have I been/am I screwed?!?!? or can I demand they send me the correct tyre and refund my £5 return postage cost too?! :cry:

kwak zzr
13-01-07, 02:26 PM
i dont know whats legal and whats not but i got done like this with infinity motorcycles when i ordered my new crash helmet from them :? when i got the lid it had a small mark on the chin piece (not a scratch but some kind of manufacturing error) and it cost me 9 pounds something to post it back to them :? they said on the phone when they receive the helmet they would post out a new one :wink:

Blue_SV650S
13-01-07, 02:45 PM
i dont know whats legal and whats not but i got done like this with infinity motorcycles when i ordered my new crash helmet from them :? when i got the lid it had a small mark on the chin piece (not a scratch but some kind of manufacturing error) and it cost me 9 pounds something to post it back to them :? they said on the phone when they receive the helmet they would post out a new one :wink:

If it was a £500 item the £10 wouldn't smart as much ... but bearing in mind the original item was £19inc, the prospect of paying over half that in postage to get the correct tyre after THEIR mistake is unacceptable to me :cry: ...

hovis
13-01-07, 02:51 PM
phone them & explain that as its their mistake .they should pay the postage?

kwak zzr
13-01-07, 06:02 PM
what hovi5 said.

grh1904
13-01-07, 06:21 PM
Sounds like their mistake - they should pay, if not why not list it on ebay & sell it. Then the buyer would have to pay for the P&P - you might then cover all your costs, or if you are out of pocket only by a quid or 2 - not the tenner you might be.

Baph
13-01-07, 06:24 PM
TBH, if I were in your shoes, I'd be tempted to stike a deal with them. Yes, so it was their fault (assuming no errors in ordering etc). However, the part you ordered may have been superceeded (unlikely I know, but it happens).

IMO, I'd be happy, in that situation, to pay £5 to send it back to them, and they pay £5 to send the right one back to you. End of the day, they're loosing a fiver that way, as well as you. The postage you pay would go to Royal Mail (or another courier) & not the store.

Mistakes happen, we're all human. I've known some companies that are far worse at picking stock in warehouses than that, mainly because they employ students to do the picking, and first thing on a saturday morning, most students are thinking about how to spend their beertokens whilst doing as little as possible to earn them.

Just my 2p.

Blue_SV650S
13-01-07, 06:48 PM
The one in the pic is still a current model, the tyre they sent me is inferior and not worth what I paid for it, for the same reason selling on eBay is not going to re-coupe me.

I am going to ring them on Monday, but I want to be armed with what i can reasonably expect them to do.

I was thinking of saying to them "look I'll post the tyre back, if you slip in a set of foot peg rubbers with the return tyre" The footpegs rubbers sell on their site for £4.50 delivered. So they probably cost them 50p-£1 ... that way I am not feeling too put out and they are not loosing much ...

What if they say they don't stock the actual tyre in the pic though?!!? A refund will mean all I have done is given Postie £10!!!

Ed
13-01-07, 07:15 PM
Is it really worth all the hassle for the princely sum of £4.75?

Blue_SV650S
13-01-07, 07:27 PM
Is it really worth all the hassle for the princely sum of £4.75?

The actual money isn't the point ... don't forget I have to trudge down the PO and bash grannies out of the way to post it back too ... its all hassle that I didn't ask for ...

They have advertised something I wanted ... charged me a healthy sum for this product (I was prepared to pay it as it was exactly what I was after) and sent me an inferior product that I can't use and they don't even list ... if I wanted this model, I could have picked up for 1/2 the price elsewhere ...

I feel I have been shafted, not that it was a simple sorting mistake (like I said, they don't even list this product).

I'll give them a ring and hopefully they have what I want in stock .... but I still begrudge having to pay the return P&P + hassle. ... I could have bought this elsewhere for less than the total spent ...

At the end of the day they sent me an unlisted inferior item, not only am I going to be out of pocket and have to wait, I have this hassle now ... all for the sake of something that is worth <£20 inc P&P!!!! :roll:

amarko5
13-01-07, 07:34 PM
Is it really worth all the hassle for the princely sum of £4.75?

I'm with Blue on this one :thumbsup:

he paid for an item :wink: they didn't deliver that item (and probably sent a lesser cost option)

they do that with 10 folks and they are making money, if they do it with 100 folks they are making a lot more money :wink:

if you paid an agreed price for a specific item then that is what you should get.

ed you wouldn't pay for a ducati 996 r and then settle for a hongdou 125 would ya :wink: now if the return small print postage of said bike was say 100 quid pro rata then you would be extreemly agrieved wouldn't you :smt046

the white rabbit
13-01-07, 07:53 PM
£5 is £5, its annoying. Bigger firms have prepaid retunrs systems. If its blatantly wrong I think they should refund postage, give you something to the value. Your out of pocket due to their error. That always smarts.

BILLY
13-01-07, 07:59 PM
I bought a power pipe off them for my sons mini moto and they said it would fit all mini moto's But it doesn't! My sons bike is the one with the separate swing arm and this stops the pipe fitting ! I have sent them 2 Emails but they have not replied to them! I'll give them a couple of days and then I'm going to raise a dispute and see how I get on.

Blue_SV650S
13-01-07, 08:24 PM
amarko5 and Dr Rich - good to see that some ppl see where I am coming from here!! to be honest if they don't at least agree to send the correct one FOC then I will cut my losses and won't send the old one back ... I am not going to throw good money after bad ... and its not worth my hassle even making the effort to get to a PO for the sort of money involved! I'll just face facts that I have been conned and shout about it to anyone who will listen not to use them ;) ... Lets not get ahead of ourselves here though, I haven't even rung them yet, lets give them a chance to resolve the issue amicably first! :)

I bought a power pipe off them for my sons mini moto and they said it would fit all mini moto's But it doesn't! My sons bike is the one with the separate swing arm and this stops the pipe fitting ! I have sent them 2 Emails but they have not replied to them! I'll give them a couple of days and then I'm going to raise a dispute and see how I get on.

I have a bolt on swingarm cag too and indeed many of the race pipes don't fit them ... you would not have known this, but it is a well known fact if you do know about them ... i.e. they should know!! :roll:

I'll be interested to know how you get on with your case ...

Ed
14-01-07, 12:04 AM
Some battles are worth fighting, some aren't...

The Duc - I'd keep the Hongdou :wink:

Gazza77
14-01-07, 01:48 AM
Contact them and tell them you expect a refund in full or a replacement that is what you ordered. Advise them at the same time that you have whatever they appear to have randomly sent out to you for them to collect at their convenience....

Blue_SV650S
15-01-07, 12:46 PM
OK, phoned back. Long story short … they don’t stock that tyre at the mo and won’t get re-stcoked until March …

I moaned moaned and showed my disappointment in the manner this thread has covered … etc etc… I also pointed out that not only did I want one like came off as I liked the way they ‘feel’, this tyre is useless to me as it would not match the front.

After all this and more … he said “Ok, we are not a bad company, how about this … for a fiver I’ll send you a matching front tyre, so you can use them as a matched pair … then in March if you send the partworn rear back, we will post you a new one like in the pic”

Under the circumstances, you can’t say fairer than that?!?!? :) (His terms and conditions do clearly state that they can change the product at will and that postage is lost on returns).

However I now have £24 worth of tyre I didn’t want and won’t use … how exactly did that happen?!!? :D

Baph
15-01-07, 01:00 PM
There you go. Classic example of stock superseding (it works backwards as well as forwards).

"We don't stock that anymore, or we won't have it in for a while, better to send SOMETHING than nothing."

Chances are, the tyre delivered to you was superseded by the one you ordered. I know in that situation, our systems would automatically re-assign the sales older so that it used any of the older stock to fulfill the order (so long as certain options were selected), then the order would be automatically placed on hold, for a human to verify it. Sometimes they call you to ask, sometimes they just do it.

I've had it before now where I've ordered thermal gloves from a company, they didn't have any in stock, so they upgraded to better quality, more expensive ones, and didn't charge me extra for it. There was a hand written notice in the package saying they didn't have the ones I ordered, so they'd replaced them with these, and hoped they were ok, but to get in touch if they weren't.

At the end of the day, they dealt with it well. But their warehousing operations could be tweaked a little to avoid all of this mess.

Congratulations on a good outcome :)

skint
15-01-07, 02:11 PM
I would still argue and demand a full refund on the basis that they delivered something you didn't order and yes I think it is worth the fight otherwise they will always get away with it.

the only thing to look out for is if their web site say's that they will send a substitute if the actual product isn't in stock. By proceeding with the order you are accepting that I would guess.

Did you pay by Credit Card? If so ring the CC co. and ask for advice, they are a powerful ally in my experience and may even recredit your card before they claim a refund from the seller, assuming they think you are entitled.

My bank has just done that for me on a direct debit I didn't recognise (I know DD have their own 'rules'). Worth a phone call? :lol:

yes we all mistakes, but then generally we have to pay for our mistakes. They could easily have contacted you regarding stock, other companies, small and large do.

good luck

Blue_SV650S
15-01-07, 04:23 PM
Ok, the other tyre hasn't been superseded by this one ... this is made by a different manufacture ... the other one is still in production and they will stock with that in March. This tyre is just a different tyre ... not only is it not what I want but I think it is inferior ... it isn't even tubless (unlike the other one that is tubless).

Imagine you paid for a Dunlop and got a Cheng Shin ... yep, both tyres, both will work ... but you wanted a Dunslip to match the front and you know you like the way the Dunslip feels ... Its not like he gave me a D208 as the D207 has now been superseeded .... He gave me a Cheng Shin and left the advert and price as a D207....

I did pay by CC and in principle what has happened here piddles me off ... but I am not loosing sight here that I am only £24 down the line and have 'something' to show for it ... its irritating, but I am not going to generate myself too much hassle to resolve it further ...

Now the bloke has tried to resolve it and he will hopefully re-think things when the next person orders ... i.e. say "By the way we have a tyre that will do the same job, but its not the one in the pic, we use them and they are fine, is that ok?!?!" ... That's all it needs .... most people would just want a replacement tyre so it doesn't matter ... I want a specific tyre ...

Baph
15-01-07, 11:28 PM
Blue, you don't seem to understand stock superseding fully.

My point was that the tyre you were sent, has more than likely been superseded by the one you ordered. Depending on the warehousing rules, it's easily possible to have stock in the warehouse that you never advertise, so never sell. This can be by different manufacturers, and can sometimes, even perform entirely different functions etc. The "old" stock can still be in production by the manufacturer, but the logistics company and/or retailer just don't want it any more. Existing "stale" stock usually gets written off at some point.

However, if the stock that has superseded an item is out, and the warehouse management system knows it was superseding something they have in stock, it can (again, depending on rules) fall back to the old, unadvertised stock.

I suspect this is what happened to you, and whilst not right, it does happen. It can (and does) happen with stock that's far more expensive than your tyre too (for example, servers worth thousands, not having critical parts for real time operations).

I'm not saying it's right, I'm not saying this definitely happened to you, but it does happen, and it's down to the people who work for the company to sort it out when the computer gets it wrong.

However, in your case, it could of just as easily been a picking/packing error. But that doesn't explain why the stock you received isn't actually listed by the retailer.

I think the solution they offered was pretty damn fair to be honest. You get to use the bike, and when they have the part in that you want, you send the one you got by mistake back, and they send you what you ordered, for a small fee. Then you can carry on as you were. You benefit possibly a few months usage on the bike for a small fee. They are probably out of pocket by a tyre, because they'll have a part-worn tyre that they have to deal with. (In reality, they'll probably send it back to the manufacturer claiming they got it like that, and get their money back that way)

Just my 2p.