Distance resistance

Online shoppers have seven days to decide on goods

Buying goods without seeing them can seem a risky business.

But online shopping or "e-tailing" is ever expanding and consumer protection laws are in place.

What you get should be what you expect, and if it's not you should expect some recourse.

Unfortunately for Working Lunch viewer Max Allsworth, it wasn't that simple.

Monitor

Max bought an LCD monitor online for £500, but when it arrived it seemed to have a fault.

Max: Opened the box

"It had a green spot on the screen. I contacted (the retailer) dabs.com and said it was faulty but they said it was within the manufacturer's specification."

Max was unhappy and contacted his local trading standards office.

They told him that under the distance selling directive, which covers online and telephone purchases, he had seven days to send his monitor back.

Unopened

Max got back in touch with dabs.com but it said the seven day rule would only apply if he hadn't opened the box - which of course he had.

The distance selling regulations - part of the Consumer Protection Regulations 2000 - state that the buyer has the right to cancel the contract within seven days of receiving the goods.

It does not refer to whether it is damaged or if you don't like it. You simply have the right.

Jonathan: "It's really a grey area"

What is does say however, is that "the customer has to take reasonable care of the goods". It's this point which clouds the issue of Max having opened his box.

"Nobody has really set a precedent yet in court, it's really a grey area," says Jonathan Wall, marketing director at dabs.com.

"We're looking for an open discussion on this with the OFT and trading standards on how we should interpret them."

Security seals

On the dabs.com website it clearly abides by the rule - stating that if you've changed your mind you may return goods.

But they do specify that the item has to be returned "in stock condition i.e. as delivered with no security seals broken".

Exceptions to the distance selling regulations include:

personalised goods

products dependent on fluctuations

unsealed recordings or software

newspapers or magazines

betting

Max had obviously broken seals when he opened the box to see his monitor.

Refund

Dabs.com has told Working Lunch that if Max's box has been opened but the monitor is in a saleable condition it will give him a refund.

Unfortunately though not everyone can get the intervention of Working Lunch.