Sent Item To Wrong Address

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 07:24

Lovely way to start the morning. Laughing at someone who messed up and demands someone else to fix it for them.

Edit: Sorry dude, you messed up big time. You've also got no legal leg to stand on. They were unsolicited goods and he is perfectly within his rights to have sold them. Even if this doesn't apply to sending goods accidentally to the wrong address, you cannot prove that he knew you made a mistake, and so he can tell everyone it arrived out of the blue and he had no idea why.

Poppy · 19 Jul 2007 at 08:56

Go knock on Matts front door with 4 of your brick**** house mates tbh and ask him to tell them about unsolictored goods.

Cuchulain · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:05

How many times do you people need telling, it's not covered under the unsolicited goods act as he did NOT expect "Matthew" to pay for the goods and they were sent accidently.

Legoman · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:08

The Unsolicited Goods Act makes it illegal for a company or individual to chase payment for an item that was sent unsolicited.

It does not make it legal to keep something that was sent to you in error.

Legoman · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:09

Cuchulain said:
How many times do you people need telling, it's not covered under the unsolicited goods act as he did NOT expect "Matthew" to pay for the goods and they were sent accidently.

Exactly.

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:09

Cuchulain said:
How many times do you people need telling, it's not covered under the unsolicited goods act as he did NOT expect "Matthew" to pay for the goods and they were sent accidently.

Unsolicited Goods are not goods sent to you and then they say "cough up". It's made abruptly clear that..

DTI said:
Under the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act 1971, (as amended) it is an offence to demand payment for goods known to be unsolicited, in other words, they were sent to a person without any prior request made by them or on their behalf.

Someone who receives goods in these circumstances may retain them as an unconditional gift, and does not have to pay for or return any unwanted goods. Anyone who receives a demand for payment for unsolicited goods should report the matter to their local Trading Standards Department.

Pretty obvious that it says you're allowed to retain unsolicited goods, which are.. that's right! Goods sent to you without your request!

Legoman said:
The Unsolicited Goods Act makes it illegal for a company or individual to chase payment for an item that was sent unsolicited.

It does not make it legal to keep something that was sent to you in error.

It makes it legal for you to keep goods that were sent to you without you requesting them.

Cuchulain · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:10

Benjarghmin said:
It makes it legal for you to keep goods that were sent to you without you requesting them.

No it doesn't.

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:13

Cuchulain said:
No it doesn't.

Read above.

Legoman · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:17

Benjarghmin said:
Unsolicited Goods are not goods sent to you and then they say "cough up". It's made abruptly clear that..

Pretty obvious that it says you're allowed to retain unsolicited goods, which are.. that's right! Goods sent to you without your request!

It makes it legal for you to keep goods that were sent to you without you requesting them.

I believe you are wrong and are mis-interpreting the UGA. The goods are not unsolicited. They were sent in error. It was not the OPs intent to send to send them as an unsolicted item.

I'm fairly sure a small claims court would find in favour of the OP.

jhmaeng · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:19

Benjarghmin said:
Legoman said:

The Unsolicited Goods Act makes it illegal for a company or individual to chase payment for an item that was sent unsolicited.

It does not make it legal to keep something that was sent to you in error.

Click to expand...

It makes it legal for you to keep goods that were sent to you without you requesting them.

Unsolicited = completely out of the blue. If I was to suddenly receive, say, some books from a company that I have absolutely no dealings with, did not know about let alone placed any orders, then that would be unsolicited.

However, if I did order something from them, then it no longer makes it unsolicited. My order makes the relationship with the seller, and any goods that are sent by mistake from the seller after my order from something else would then be covered by the "It does not make it legal to keep something that was sent to you in error".

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 09:24

Legoman said:
I believe you are wrong and are mis-interpreting the UGA. The goods are not unsolicited. They were sent in error. It was not the OPs intent to send to send them as an unsolicted item.

I'm fairly sure a small claims court would find in favour of the OP.

No, they wouldn't. If I shot you 'on accident', would they favour me because it was an accident? The law is the law.

Yes I know that's an extreme example, but I am making my point. They are unsolicited goods as he recieved them without request, it makes no difference whether it was accidental or not.

Jhmaeng said:
However, if I did order something from them, then it no longer makes it unsolicited. My order makes the relationship with the seller, and any goods that are sent by mistake from the seller after my order from something else would then be covered by the "It does not make it legal to keep something that was sent to you in error".

The definition of unsolicited goods, is really, really simple. They have not been requested. Therefore it doesn't matter if you've dealt with the person before. You did NOT request the item, making it unsolicited.

Edit: I'd just like to make it clear I'm going on the extracts of the law I've seen. I know in some states in the USA accidents do not count as unsolicited goods, but as of yet, I've found nothing saying the same here in the UK.

div0 · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:03

Benjarghmin said:
The definition of unsolicited goods, is really, really simple. They have not been requested. Therefore it doesn't matter if you've dealt with the person before. You did NOT request the item, making it unsolicited.

Surely it can't quite be THAT simple - otherwise if I order something online and they send the wrong item, I can say that I did not request THIS item and it is therefore unsolicited goods, so I'm keeping it, but please fulfil my actual order as well.

Lawyers get paid a lot of money to argue over ways to interpret the law - so I doubt OcUK are going to be able to come to a 100% accurate answer here

From the recipient's point of view, it DOES look like the item was recieved as unsolicited goods, and there looks to be a legal argument to support this too.

From the senders point of view, he has evidence to support his claim that the item was sent in ERROR, and there MAY be an argument against it being treated as Unsolicited Goods.

From the senders point of view there have also been recent dealings with the recipient, this MAY also provide a way to argue against the item being sent as Unsolicited Goods.

Without proper legal advice I can see that both parties will try to convince the other that they are right. The other guy is NOT going to back down now UNLESS you go all the way to begining legal action IMO. If you ARE going to go ahead with legal action, then get LEGAL ADVICE FIRST! Do NOT send any more correspondace to him (due to the POSSIBILITY of the item actually being Unsolicited Goods and you then actually breaking the Law by demanding payment). Get the legal advice first, then make a decision on what to do. They will sort out relevant correspondace if required.

Proceeeding on your own without PROPER advice is likely to end up losing you more money, and possibly get you in further trouble.

You have two choices:

Cut your losses and move on.
Get legal advice (start with CAB) before doing ANYTHING else.

If you try to proceed in another way, then it does look like there is at least a reasonable possibility of things getting worse for you.

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:09

div0 said:
Surely it can't quite be THAT simple - otherwise if I order something online and they send the wrong item, I can say that I did not request THIS item and it is therefore unsolicited goods, so I'm keeping it, but please fulfil my actual order as well.

&

From the senders point of view, he has evidence to support his claim that the item was sent in ERROR, and there MAY be an argument against it being treated as Unsolicited Goods.

&

From the senders point of view there have also been recent dealings with the recipient, this MAY also provide a way to argue against the item being sent as Unsolicited Goods.

Receiving the wrong thing and receiving unsolicited goods are not the same thing. You're just reading possibilities into the situation which serve no purpose as they are not related, and they only lead to more confusion.

Second part, maybe true. As I've said, though, I've not found anything to state that accidents do not count as unsolicited goods in the UK as of yet.

Third part, no. That's a completely different order. He did not request this item, therefore it is unsolicited.

The sooner you lot realise that it is unsolicited no matter what that leads to, the better. It is unsolicited, mkay? Whether that puts Hyper in the right as it was an accident, or the other guy in the right, is what this debate is about.

Dave M · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:15

Benjarghmin said:
The sooner you lot realise that it is unsolicited no matter what that leads to, the better. It is unsolicited, mkay? Whether that puts Hyper in the right as it was an accident, or the other guy in the right, is what this debate is about.

Show me the case law or stop being so condescending.

div0 · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:19

Benjarghmin said:
Receiving the wrong thing and receiving unsolicited goods are not the same thing. You're just reading possibilities into the situation which serve no purpose as they are not related, and they only lead to more confusion.

Sorry, my post was being pedantic - I knew what you meant - I was just pointing out that it is not quite as simple as you made out in the previous post. I thought I'd made that quite clear

Benjarghmin said:
Second part, maybe true. As I've said, though, I've not found anything to state that accidents do not count as unsolicited goods in the UK as of yet.

That's my point.

Benjarghmin said:
Third part, no. That's a completely different order. He did not request this item, therefore it is unsolicited.

I am agreeing with you - but my post wasn't very clear (I admit).

I'm not arguing against whether the item was Unsolicited (as from the recipients point of view it clearly is) and I think that's all that matters.

What I was trying to point out is whether the Law on Unsolicited Goods is quite as cut and dried as it appears at first glance (so as to favour the recipient in this case). Or whether there are some arguments that the sender may have to argue a case against the laws stated for Unsolicited Goods.

Sorry if it wasn't clear. I think we're making the same (or similar) points.

Benjarghmin said:
The sooner you lot realise that it is unsolicited no matter what that leads to, the better. It is unsolicited, mkay? Whether that puts Hyper in the right as it was an accident, or the other guy in the right, is what this debate is about.

However here I'm not quite so sure. You may be, but I wouldn't personally make the same claim.

wordy · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:19

Benjarghmin said:
Lovely way to start the morning. Laughing at someone who messed up and demands someone else to fix it for them.

Edit: Sorry dude, you messed up big time. You've also got no legal leg to stand on. They were unsolicited goods and he is perfectly within his rights to have sold them. Even if this doesn't apply to sending goods accidentally to the wrong address, you cannot prove that he knew you made a mistake, and so he can tell everyone it arrived out of the blue and he had no idea why.

Do you laugh at people who make honest mistakes often?

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:22

Telescopi said:
Show me the case law or stop being so condescending.

The law is not "interpretable" in the sense of what the definition of unsolicited goods are. Once again..

DTI said:
Under the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act 1971, (as amended) it is an offence to demand payment for goods known to be unsolicited, in other words, they were sent to a person without any prior request made by them or on their behalf.

For anyone who has the ability to read, it is clearly stated.

Hyper · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:23

Morning lads,

This topic seems to have caused a bit of a stir, just keep it clean as I dont want it getting locked.

I sent off a letter this morning via Royal Mail 1st Class Recorded so he should receive it tomorrow and he has 14 days from when he receives it to either return the item or pay up the full amount it was sold for on ebay.

If not, off to the small claims court I go

Will keep you all updated

Nebzor · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:26

Hyper said:
Morning lads,

This topic seems to have caused a bit of a stir, just keep it clean as I dont want it getting locked.

I sent off a letter this morning via Royal Mail 1st Class Recorded so he should receive it tomorrow and he has 14 days from when he receives it to either return the item or pay up the full amount it was sold for on ebay.

If not, off to the small claims court I go

Will keep you all updated

You could've just made a big mistake, mate. Did you go to the CAB or get a lawyer involved? If this is classed as unsolicited goods (which I obviously think it is.. but that's besides the point) then you've just broken the law, which.. if it comes to it, could get you fined £5,000.

div0 · 19 Jul 2007 at 10:27

I hope it works out for you.

But as per my post above I don't think you should have sent him any more correspondance until you'd had proper advice. I'd be surprised if he backs down, based on your letter. He may back down eventually, but if I were you I'd have tried to get proper legal advice first.

At the moment there is a CHANCE that he is in the right (in the eyes of the Law) and IF that is the case, then by demanding payment from him, you COULD be making things worse for yourself.

As I say, I hope things work out well for you - as morally you are definately in the right!