In a guide by retired judge Stephen Gold, strategies for resolving issues regarding faulty deliveries are detailed. Gold provides insights into the steps to take if a wrong or damaged item is received, or if the delivery never shows up.
‘Oh, no. They’ve sent the wrong damned thing!’ ‘Blast, the bottle is smashed.’
You know that feeling of doom when opening the box with the product you were looking forward to receiving.
To simplify the process, understanding your legal entitlements is crucial. We will also explore real customer encounters and upcoming consumer welfare legislations.
1. Wrong product delivered: The saga of the shoes
Upon opening the package that arrived at my doorstep, instead of the brown casual shoes I had purchased online, there was a discrepancy. The item inside did not match what was indicated on the box label.
But I found a pair of formal black shoes there instead.
Here we are looking at the seller supplying a product you never ordered: an ice box rather than a hot water bottle, or formal shoes rather than casual shoes. And, yes, black instead of brown.
Stephen Gold received ‘measly’ compensation of £11 from Ecco – but find out how he ended up receiving many times that sum
No prize for guessing that you don’t have to keep the wrong product. You can demand that the seller does better second time around, and, if the right product is out of stock, that the seller puts you in the same position in which you would have been had they done what they agreed to do.Â
If that means paying you compensation, then so be it.
Ecco, which has looked after my feet (including an inflamed big toe which has nothing to do with an excess consumption of sherry) for years, with excellent products, was the seller.
It is the customer care department which has let Ecco down. While apologetic throughout, they maintained a stance on certain issues which was legally misconceived.
I had no problem with providing a photo of the black shoes but then, I asked, should I return the black shoes or would they collect them?
Ecco insisted on me taking the wrong shoes to their nearest branch or a post office. For reasons with which I will not bore you, and which have nothing to do with that big toe, this raised a problem for me.
I asked them to arrange a courier to collect them, or accept my offer to make that arrangement myself, through Royal Mail, if they reimbursed the charge.
They refused and relied on their terms and conditions which they argued backed their stance.
But they didn’t. What they were relying on had nothing to do with sending back something the customer had never ordered.
They relented and had a courier collect the shoes at their expense, although the courier failed to turn up on the first date fixed.
When was I entitled to a refund? Ecco said when they got the black shoes back. I said immediately.
They had broken the contract and were sitting on my money. When a date for their courier to collect had been fixed, they relented and correctly made a refund before the shoes were returned.
The shoes I wanted were out of stock when I complained. While arguing things out with customer care, I ordered online another pair which were a very close match to the pair I had first ordered and paid for them.
Where from? Ecco, of course. The first pair had been discounted: the second pair were not.
Ecco subsequently made up the price difference (better than previous proposals which had started with 10 per cent off my next purchase) and threw in £11 for compensation.
Ecco’s products are excellent, but I had ordered brown casual shoes from them not these formal black shoes
The legal principle at work there was that I was entitled to be put in the same position I would have been in if the seller had done what they had contracted to do (or as close to it as reasonably possible).
What about the compensation for inconvenience? I thought £11 was measly. Traders who have broken their contracts will sometimes offer something out of grace, although the law makes it hard to obtain it if they refuse.
You would need to prove physical inconvenience, like living in a damp atmosphere because your landlord was in breach of repair obligations.
Otherwise, you would have to show that the contract was related to your personal or family life – possibly your feet – and that the inconvenience suffered would have been contemplated by the trader.
You won’t generally score compensation for mental distress for breach of contract. Banging your mouse because of non-delivery of a new laptop will not get you anywhere, for example, and will be bad for the mouse.
But under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, which we will look at in a minute, you may be able to collect compensation for ‘alarm, distress or physical inconvenience or discomfort’.
After further representations to Ecco, they refunded me the rest of the price I had paid for the second pair of shoes which meant total compensation of around £91.
To their credit, they ‘sincerely apologised’ for the inconvenience I had experienced with my recent order and the customer care department. And that came from their customer care department!
It followed an exchange of some 14 emails, most of them quite lengthy, so I think I deserved it.
Postscript: Ecco has been emailing me for my opinion on my recent purchases of two pairs of brownish shoes.
2. Defective product delivered: The £2.70 powder blusher
Where the delivered product is sub-standard – not of satisfactory quality, fit for purpose or as described – you, as a consumer, will generally be legally entitled to reject it by making it clear to the trader that they must have it back.
This should usually be done within 30 days of delivery (although you will have other rights outside that time frame).
The Consumer Rights Act 2015 says that you have a duty to make the product available for collection – so it is down to the trader or their courier to come to you to get the product. Alternatively, if there is an agreement for you to return it then you must keep to that agreement.
Either way, the trader must bear the reasonable costs of getting back what they delivered to you.
There should be no undue delay in the trader making you a refund and under no circumstances should it be later than 14 days from when the trader has agreed to reimbursement.
The trader cannot insist on having the product safe in their hands before paying you out, but a swap of product for the money might often be reasonable.
Different rules apply to cancellation of a product ordered online under distance sales legislation.
This is likely to happen because you simply changed your mind about wanting the product without complaining there is anything wrong with it.
Then it will be for you to return, unless the trader has agreed to collect, and at your expense and you should usually have a price refund no later than 14 days from return, when that was down to you.
Getting broken items replacedÂ
What about your right to a replacement? You can opt for the trader to replace (or repair) the sub-standard product as an alternative to rejecting it.
That is what I did with a £2.70 powder blusher (not for me) which I ordered from Boots as part of a £57.83 outlay.
The blusher was cracked to pieces on delivery. Boots refused to replace on the ground that the item was sold for less than £5. That was their policy.
It refunded the £2.70 and, rather meanly, forfeited the loyalty points credited for the product.
Eventually and after my protests, the customer care department gave me £5 worth of loyalty points as a ‘goodwill gesture’. But nobody at Boots would tell me the legal basis for its no-replacement stance.
Boots had no legitimate legal basis for refusing to replace. It can be refused if replacement is impossible or is disproportionate compared with any other remedy available, such as a refund.
It never suggested that the blusher was out of stock and there was clearly nothing disproportionate in the retailer straining itself to post me another one. I say that Boots was not following the law.
Incidentally, a replacement should be made when required within a reasonable time and the trader should bear any necessary costs involved, including postage.
3. No delivery: How long must you wait
If you haven’t agreed a particular date or window for delivery, the trader must deliver without undue delay, and no later than 30 days from when you agreed to buy.
Once the 30 days are up, you can specify a period for delivery that is appropriate in the circumstances and demand delivery by the end of that period.
Still no show? You can tell the trader you are treating the contract as at an end and buy elsewhere.
You would be entitled to a price refund and compensation should you be financially worse off.
Don’t make your delivery deadline too short, or it could be legally ineffective. Around 28 days will normally be sufficient.
Where possible, extract agreement from the trader for a delivery deadline which cannot be missed as a condition of buying.
Then, if that is missed, you can cancel without giving more time. Insist on words being added to the invoice like ‘Delivery by 1 November 2025 is essential. Time shall be of the essence.’
4. Reverse delivery: The £300 electric toothbrush
We meet Boots again. Last January, my friend Philip returned his £300 electric toothbrush to the company through Royal Mail because it clapped out during the guarantee period.
Boots spent over five weeks sending him a succession of contradictory and sometimes repetitive emails which disputed that he had returned the product.
It even went as far as libelling him by writing that it had concerns about the ‘legitimacy’ of his claim for repair or replacement – effectively an allegation of attempted fraud – and was rejecting it notwithstanding that he had sent written proof of delivery soon afterwards.
After an exchange of 26 emails, Boots have just finally admitted that it had the toothbrush all along and was refunding the purchase price but – and this again – deducting the loyalty points allocated on purchase.
Boots wrote: ‘The full details of your complaint have been logged with the relevant teams across the business so that they are aware of what has happened, and we can take any action necessary to try and prevent similar instances from happening again in the future.’
But no hint of any compensation. Philip asked for Boots’ proposals to reflect inconvenience, aggravation, his time wastage (three hours) and the libel.
It credited him with 1,000 loyalty points. ‘Not good enough,’ he said. It credited him with another 2,000 loyalty points. ‘Not good, enough,’ he said. It is paying him £50.
But for the limited publication of the libel within Boots, the libel would have been much more serious and attracted substantial damages.
Retired judge and writer Stephen GoldÂ
Ex-judge Stephen Gold’s The Return of Breaking Law, published by Bath Publishing, is an irreverent guide of over 750 pages to legal rights and winning in court or losing well.Â
It is full of tips and template documents and letters.Â
Among the numerous other areas featured are consumer rights, financial remedies on divorce, succeeding on small claims, making a will, battling with sellers, creditors, domestic abusers, lenders and landlords – and how Stephen coped as lawyer to the Kray Twins.
5. Delivery without a request: An unconditional gift
New consumer laws that came into force on 6 April 2025 – a chunk of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 – reintroduce a delightful ‘inertia selling’ right.
This is where you receive a product from a trader which you have never requested and are met with a request to pay for it, return it or safely store it.
You can ignore the request and treat it as an unconditional gift.
The Act also has a lot to say about certain unfair commercial practices. These can not only lead to the guilty trader being prosecuted but to you, the consumer, having a right to compensation from them which is often overlooked.
The Competition and Markets Authority will now be empowered to directly enforce trader breaches without having to go through the courts to do this.
For the time being, pending more of the Act being implemented, the practices as set out in those Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations will continue to apply in relation to you seeking that compensation, if necessary, from the county court.
If you reckon that your trader has been up to no good in some way, the chances are that the regulations will catch the transgression.
There are some 32 outlawed unfair practices.
They include inviting you to buy while knowing that the product will not be available for a reasonable period of time and without disclosing that fact.
And falsely stating that a product will only be available for a limited period so as to get you to decide to buy without the opportunity to make an informed decision.
If you are significantly misled, you may be able to escape from the deal.
Alternatively, you could be entitled to keep the product but receive a discount, ranging from 25 per cent to 100 per cent of the price, depending on how serious was the practice.
In addition, there could be compensation to cover financial loss.
Happy shopping.
