You know I laughed when I read the last portion of your comment but after today, I'm seriously considering this as an option. :o) After HoF promising to send a fax to UK Mail of a receipt that the driver would give me when collecting the parcel ... it all went horribly wrong. Again. The Driver turned up [his first day on the job apparently] and did not have any receipt for me. I explained the situation and he phoned his boss, who told him that he should have had a receipt book on his van [talk about deja vu] but he didn't. He offered to 'post me a receipt' in the future. So I still have the parcel. And consequently no refund. HoF keep insisting that if the item goes missing in transit they'll accept liability. I've told them if that's the case they can put it in writing in an email. Then I'll happily hand over the £160 item ... without getting a receipt. Contacted Trading Standards today and they recommened same. To be continued I suppose. House of Fraser [& UK Mail] .... Never again. *shudders*

I needed to return a substandard item to HoF [House of Fraser - online] and being housebound, the item had to be collected. It was booked for Thursday this week ... the courier being UK Mail. They never turned up. HoF didn't know why. UK Mail didn't know why either. I was told to phone this morning to find out when [or if] they would collect today. HoF couldn't contact UK Mail from 9am until 1pm. When they did finally get through to them, they were able to let me know that a driver would pick up between 1pm and 3pm today. Driver arrived at 3.20pm. I asked for a receipt. He didn't have his receipt book on the van. So I said I'd need to phone the company as I wasn't handing over a valuable item [worth £160] without a receipt. He took off and never came back. I phone HoF who initially told me ...'they don't do receipts'. That fact seems to change with each person at HoF I've spoken to since. One of their reps at one point, when they couldn't organise the collection suggested that I leave the parcel on the front door step if I didn't want to be further inconvenienced and 'someone' would pick the parcel up eventually. I asked the rep in question if she would be willing to leave something of value on her doorstep for collection ... to which she answered 'no she wouldn't'. So was I right to insist on a receipt? I order online all the time and I would never dream of returning an item with a courier if they didn't give me some sort of collection acknowledgement. Because if the item went missing in transit, I'm sure neither HoF or UK Mail would take responsibility and I'd be left out of pocket by £160. The final phone call of the day was with someone from HoF's 'Customer Service High Level Complaints Team' who again stated that they didn't do collection receipts. However on this occasion, he said they would be willing to give one to the driver who was apparently going to pick up the item on Monday and he could hand it in to me. It's an ongoing issue. God knows when it will be resolved. I've made a formal complaint. But I wanted to know if others feel I was right to refuse to hand over the item when I wasn't given some form of receipt for same. The item in question was a canteen of gold cutlery btw.

It looks like I should be covered under the DSR but I don't think this seller is going to make things easy for me. I sent her another email stating that I would be taking advice from trading standards, to which she replied that she was 'glad to hear I was involving a reputable external body'. And I didn't pay for the item by credit card unfortunately. It was paid for through PayPal. I'm wondering if I do run into problems whether I should involve them? Cheers for responding so quickly. Much appreciated.

I bought a nickel lantern from an online retailer. Prior to the purchase I contacted the seller to confirm that the item was in perfect condition [it's actually a gift for someone] as I'd purchased the same lantern from a different retailer that arrived in a dreadful condition. The new seller actually sent me a photograph showing two tiny dents in the lantern door which she felt were just a fault in the manufacturing process. As they appeared minor I said I would go ahead with the sale, IF this was the only fault. The lantern arrived today. There are dents all over the lantern. And in places, the nickel plating has either worn away or was never there in the first place. I contacted the seller stating same and that I would be sending the lantern back for a full refund [including return postage costs]. I also said that I was annoyed that she had misrepresented the condition of the item. I had a one line return message from her referring me to her terms and conditions. I don't see any reference to return costs. I have a bad feeling about this transaction. What are my rights? Cheers .