Hi, Apologies if this is in the wrong forum. My wife posted some tops to her sister in Cyprus last week for her birthday. She paid £14.10 for the Royal Mail Track and Trace service and was told it would take 3 to 5 working days for delivery. As one does, we kept monitoring it's progress and it hasn't moved from their Heathrow depot. We left it 6 working days before asking the post office what was happening and they told us to phone Heathrow. The number I found for the depot no longer exists and forums suggest they don't have a single telephone at the whole depot. Anyway, as our local post office don't seem have reached the chapter on answering the telephone yet, my wife went there again and they told her to ring the main telephone number for Royal Mail 0345 774 0740. They tell me the package is on the way back to us as no customs certificate was enclosed. I questioned if this wasn't the job of the post office staff to give us the form to complete. He says not, it is the job of the sender. OK, we take a parcel to the post office and ask: 1. The types of postage available for Cyprus? 2. The cost of sending the package? 3. The timeframe for delivery? Is it unreasonable to expect them to tell us we need to complete a customs form and hand us the form to complete before accepting the parcel? The 2 sisters normally just do bank transfers for birthdays and it's years since we send anything overseas. We will now have missed my sister-in-law's birthday and the Royal Mail jobsworth tells me we will have to pay again for this. Am I wrong in thinking this is unfair? Many thanks, David

OK, I found the letter I was looking for: Dear Sir/Madam, Reference: [order number] On [date], I placed an order for a [item] and it was delivered by you on [date]. I have discovered that the [item] has the following problem: [give details]. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 makes it an implied term of the contract that goods be as described, of satisfactory quality and fit for purpose. Any returns policy that says I have to cover the cost of returning items must only relate to the situation where I change my mind about the item ordered and not where there is a problem with the item. I should not lose out financially as a result of your breach of contract and accordingly all costs of returning the item should be met by you. I also require you to confirm you will arrange for [the item] to be collected. I look forward to hearing from you. Yours faithfully, [Your name]

Hi Robert, I'm glad you got your money back eventually, but we shouldn't have to go through this Chinese dance where you start off with an offer of a partial refund and ALWAYS end up with a full refund in the end anyway. I just know that for every you and I that see it through to the end there are many that can't be bothered, like most of the friends I've told. Anyway, if everyone took that attitude we'd all be speaking German now, wouldn't we!! Thanks, David I suppose the three key questions I am asking are: 1. Can a business insist that the buyer is responsible for costs of returning items that are way smaller or larger than the size ordered to a foreign destination without making it clear in their adverts (websites) it is outside the country of purchase? 2. Can they still insist upon the buyer being responsible for carriage when the goods can be quite easily be identified as being faulty by photograph? 3. Can the seller imply at point of sale how easy refunds are and then be truthful later, when asked for a refund? To me this is just good, old fashioned fraud, yet the Chinese try to get away with it all the time.

Hi, I know dx advised me to let this go, but I would like to check out a point. I have just spent the last two weeks updating my IT business website and I am nearly finished. I purchased the domain names scamhound.com and scamhound.co.uk, specifically to target companies like ChicV and their 120 websites and we will be starting on that shortly. What I want to know is how much companies can bend the law on the Internet before it is considered broken? I responded to an ad that came to me via Google Adsense, believing I was dealing with a reputable American company. I know we should always read the small print but how many of us do. I buy lots on the Internet every week, knowing if it is not suitable or faulty, I can easily get it exchanged or refunded. That said, I always avoid Chinese sellers. What if the seller knowingly sells shoddy, unsaleable goods on the web stating “If you are not entirely satisfied with your purchase, it is easy to exchange or get a refund. It does say --Customers will be charged for shipping costs based on different delivery rate. Customer also be responsible for the return fee. When you request a refund you find it is NOT easy like they say, They reply: Our return center is located in Guangzhou, China. According to our return policy, the customer is responsible for return shipping cost and any other related return charges (including possible custom fees). Your refund will be processed after our return center received and inspected the return package. Since International returns might result in long waiting time and incur substantial return costs on your side, we recommend some alternative methods to resolve this issue. We would like to offer you a 15% cash refund instead of returning the item(s). If there are any sizing issues, you can use this fund to alter the cloth. They gradually up their offer to 50% and emphasise the costs of sending things to China and according to Trustpilot many returns come back “Not known at this address.” Can businesses really get away with this in 2020 and shouldn't the seller be automatically be responsible for the return of faulty goods? Before someone says they weren't faulty, just poor quality in your opinion, I purchased 4 summer tops for my wife and two left her boobs totally exposed as they were produced not with a front and a back but two backs. To me, that's faulty. I know I can do a chargeback on Paypal but they are still not taking calls because of covid-19.

Thanks dx, of course you are right, but I am quite enjoying playing games with them while thing are quiet.

I am still waiting to hear back from Paypal, but more annoyed with Trustpilot at the moment. I have been trying to warn people via Trustpilot about these guys and within hours all my posts have been removed and my account locked, This just happened for the sixth time and nothing has been received from them to say I have done anything wrong and there is no way to contact them. The posts I have submitted typically say: Noracora’s website claim their address is CHICV UK LIMITED, Suite 31a, Philpot House, Rayleigh, Essex, SS6 7HH（NOT RETURN ADDRESS） Noracora are as British as Kim Jong-un. They are really based in Hong Kong and mainland China as one of 111+ websites belonging to ChicV International Holdings Ltd and any search of ChicV will reveal them as one of the World’s leading purveyors of crap clothing.made by poorly paid workers in the unbearably rank sweatshops of Hong Kong and China, in conditions that would not be accepted anywhere else in the World. I am still chasing a refund from Damensein, also a ChicV company, so feel qualified to warn anyone I can, not to make the same mistake I did. ChicV’s MO is: Make very cheap copies of designer clothes they find on the Internet, present great websites with a promise of easy returns and refunds, and, in many cases, imply they are UK or US based. They send out very poorly made, undersized clothes using the cheapest quality material and when angry customers demand refunds, they disclose that they have to be returned to China, and warning them how costly this is and may incur extra duty fees. To help, they jump in with an offer that starts at 15% gradually rising to 50% if persistent. As can be scene on Trustpilot reviews this is how all their sites work, If you notice some have many 5* reviews dig deeper until you come across the bad reviews. So far, I have found 111 ChicV websites and have a further 350 yet to check. The ones so far are: Then I name all the sites. I think in the UK, Europe and America we have a false sense of security that most websites are honest and, anyway, we have the law on our side. When we come across crooks like these guys and they tell us by clicking the BUY NOW button we have agreed to all there terms, we are not prepared for it. How can this be acceptable in 2020? If you check out sister website, floryday,com on Trustpilot they seem ok, so long as you don't dig too deep into the reviews. However, if you check the website and see what you are signing up to, you will see you are agreeing you are responsible for the full costs of returning clothes even if they send the wrong size which is frequently the case. This is even before you find they have to be returned to China. I've tried doing a WHOIS on the websites - all are with GoDaddy and many confirm they are ChicV but owners are hidden on most. If I am right that all 111 websites are part of ChicV then Trustpilot has received nearly 40,000 one star reviews about these guys. If other sites, which I have yet to verify are part of this group, the figure is nearly 60,000. Even if only 1 in every 1,000 of these unhappy people complained to the right channels these crooked sites would soon be a distant memory. I hope that many people have managed to do chargebacks through their banks, cards and Paypal, as this seems the ONLY way you will get it. How are these guys not breaking the law in this day and age? I hope someone comes out with an app which won’t let you make a payment to a new company until you have confirmed you have checked them out on sites like Trustpilot. Can anyone see what I could have said to get me kicked out of Trutspilot? I have seen far worse posts. I posted a comment on Trustpilot on the trustpilot.com review page and within 20 minutes this was removed and the account locked.

Hi, Before I start complaining to Paypal, ASA, Google ads, etc, I have attached a few photos of the finishing of front hems on one of the tops, which to me is even bad by Chinese standards. They say: "Sorry that you are not satisfied with the item(s). Please note that customers must respond to every email within 7 days. If not, we will close this case after the aforementioned deadline. Our return center is located in Guangzhou, China. According to our return policy, the customer is responsible for return shipping cost and any other related return charges (including possible custom fees). Your refund will be processed after our return center received and inspected the return package. Since International returns might result in long waiting time and incur substantial return costs on your side, we recommend some alternative methods to resolve this issue. We would like to offer you a 15% cash refund instead of returning the item(s). If there are any sizing issues, you can use this fund to alter the cloth." Are they able to insist that the goods are sent back to China when the goods are of a substandard quality? There was nothing on the advert to indicate they were not in the UK. I am attaching the original adverts of the two poorly finished tops, and, yes, I can see the hems are neatly frayed on the second top, but there is a big difference between neatly frayed and what we received. pix.pdf

Thanks for that. We received the refund promised already and the order today. Four pairs of earrings were quite nice, my wife likes them, which is all that matters. One doesn't close. Two tops were ok. Primark quality for Primark prices, so passable. The finishing of the remaining two tops was dreadful, you couldn't even give them to a charity shop. So I will request a refund for £31.75 tonight and warn them of my actions if they refuse. No doubt they will refuse, so I will chase Paypal until they agree one, which I have done before, and always got one in the end.

Thanks dx, I agree. Have yet to come across a Chinese company where I didn't get the money back on quality issues, but plenty of things from there are great. Just not a great good to crap ratio! Anyway, the refund for the two out of stock tops has arrived, so maybe they have changed their ways.

No worries. I will just keep at it, until we get all the money back. They are very tetchy on bad reviews.

Thanks for confirming was AdSense, Bank Fodder. Don't worry, I have seen enough pirated software sold this way to realise just how bona fide these ads are. I was just worried about others being taken in. I paid by Paypal for this and I have had to request chargebacks through them a few times before - always to Chinese companies. I did pay using a Visa card, so I would try section 75 if Paypal get funny, but it is under £100. I wish we had spent another £10 to take it over the threshold.

As I review this post, on the left hand side of the screen under announcements between the tweets and posts are four adverts for the company I am criticising. This implies that they advertise through CAG and have been carefully vetted which I realise is NOT the case, but you can understand why someone would think that. Does anyone know where these ads are generated from? Is it Google AdSense? Why do they appear on some websites and not others?

During the coronavirus lockdown my wife started getting online adverts from a company called Damensein with some excellent deals on what appeared good quality tops and tacky earrings. As they were presumably coming through Googles ads or adsense, we thought they were kosher, and because you had to spend £89+ to quality for free delivery, we assumed it was coming from the USA. It was, of course, coming from China. she placed an order for just over £90 and waited patiently after confirmation that she would be advised when the goods were being shipped. When no advise arrived after a week I checked them out. They have a 96% BAD rating on Trustpilot, with two related companies, Holapick which appears to be their outlet in the USA, and Floryday (worldwide). From what I can see the poor Americans are treated worse than us (must be something to do with the Donald), they are lucky to receive anything. The Floryday reviews webpage actually warns "Dear Trustpilot users, Trustpilot has been notified that this business has offered refunds conditional on the removal of negative reviews on Trustpilot. This behavior contravenes our guidelines as it might have a misleading impact on the TrustScore and consumers. The integrity of our community is something we take very seriously. We'll therefore continue our efforts to safeguard the integrity of the platform, and we'll inform our users when we uncover attempts of misuse." Never come across that before. This site also looks heavily doctored with regular postings up to 10 five star reviews in a row where the reviewer has only ever written one review and nothing else in the last year. Anyway, the main complaints are their order seem to take many months to arrive, the order is incomplete yet they deny this, the sizing is way out and the quality is appalling, nothing like the advert. When the customer requests a refund they are told: Our return center is located in Guangzhou, China. According to our return policy, the customer is responsible for return shipping cost and any other related return charges (including possible custom fee). Your refund will be processed after our return center received and inspected the return package. Since International return might result in long waiting time and incur substantial return cost on your side, we recommend some alternative methods to resolve this issue. We would like to offer you 15% cash refund instead of returning the item(s). If there are any sizing issues, you can use this fund to alter the cloth. If you still want to return/exchange the package, you should email us for a return label within 7 days, the aforementioned deadline. You can check the return policy here:https://damensein.com/pages/return-exchange *Kind reminder: Any addresses on the parcel are not approved as the return address. Returned package without an authorized return address from customer service representatives will not be refunded or exchanged. * Many of the reviews confirm the company is unknown at the returns address they are given. My questions are: 1. My wife has attempted to cancel the order only to be told part of the order was already in transit - (two tops were unavailable and will be refunded). 2. They claimed these were shipped on June 6, We insisted they provide consignment number etc and received this after several attempts on Friday. The system has just updated and this would seem to indicate it started it's journey yesterday, seven days later than they claim. 3. We have responded to an online ad in the UK. How are we protected? I know we can cancel the order up to 14 days after they are delivered, but we are responsible for delivery costs. Is this the case if the quality is as bad as others say? 4. We were unaware where the seller was based and they obviously use this to their advantage, can this be the case? Our first action would be to attempt to get a refund through Paypal, which I have done in the past, and if they refuse contact the credit card company used to pay Paypal. I would also contact the ASA and Google about their ads, which I would say are brilliant. Any advice on our rights would be great.

OK, let's see what happens.

dx says "they'll look fools if they raise a claim for penalty fees", andyorch says "A Solicitor can become a claimant in its own right when claiming for costs uncured in the process of litigation." As they are requesting direct payment rather than to their client, I tend to agree with the latter opinion. The solicitors say there is no defence as I have paid the original sum, so what would my defence be? 1. The payment of the account had been delayed because we were awaiting a credit note and then the lockdown. I had advised the creditor that payment would be made by the end of April, which it was. This was emailed to them before the solicitors became involved. 2. The solicitors wrote to me the day before Good Friday and sending their letter second class, giving me less than 24 hours to pay it. 3. The solicitors misquoted tha Act saying they would charge a fee £40 per invoice, when it is £40 per debt under £1,000. 4. The solicitors then tried to charge £80 without any breakdown of their figures. If I do leave it, rather than rattling the cage, and they do issue, as I feel they will, how will the court view my defence?

see my post 28 dx

There were 4 invoices in total - 3 for goods I received in perfect condition and these have now been paid. One invoice was for a faulty toner cartridge, and this after a long wait was fully credited at the end of February.

OK, reviewing things. If I leave it and hope it goes away, it could be £158, made up of late payment fee/interest of £83, solicitors fee - £50, online summons fee - £25. I know you think they wouldn't be arsed for such a small amount, but they would get £133 for 10 minutes work from a poorly paid junior, for what they see as an open and shut case. If I agree to settle the corrected amount now, it would be £43 Sometimes you have cut your losses.

Is there a set maximum for <£100?

Sorry, I shouldn't have said "costs," how much is the solicitor's fee?

If they do issue a claim, the fee is £35/£25 online, what can they add as their costs?

see post 26 dx

This ACT, http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/20/contents see section 5a.

I appreciate what you are both saying, but these solicitor, Flint Bishop, do seem idiots. However, there is an act in place to say they can recover £40 plus interest. If they pushed it and they do seem petty enough to do so, it will triple that amount.

They write: As stated in our letter, our client is entitled to compensation and interest pursuant to statute, and a balance of £83 remains due. Payment is due within 7 days of the date of this letter,failing which we are instructed to issue a County Court Claim. This will add additional costs which will be claimed from you. Please note that you have acknowledged the debt was due by paying the principal debt, therefore, there can be no valid defence for any claim made, Interestingly they then request payment be made directly to them and not the client. I wonder if their client will see any of that??