Online order - offer and acceptance John Lewis clarification

[yellowplum]

I am curious at what point order and acceptance has been made with an order placed with a retailer as John Lewis.  If you order something that is not in stock and they claim to have it in stock within 3 weeks. If the item was originally ordered as out of stock with a pending delivery date and also that the full amount of the item was taken. 

 

When is the retailer legally obliged to deliver the goods?

 

What recourse if any is there?

[Kyosanto]

If you haven't yet received the goods you are entitled to cancel your order and get a full refund, regardless of anything else.

[yellowplum]

I realise that, I was more trying to find out how contractually obligated they are to supply them.   They have charged the card but have not said anything else.  The original email said they would arrive in three weeks, now the website is saying nine weeks. 

 

 

[Manxman in exile]

You need to look at JL's T&Cs for online sales.  Many supplier's T&Cs stipulate that a contract is only formed when the supplier actually despatches the purchased goods to the buyer.

 

If JL have such a term then they have not yet accepted your offer to buy the goods and there is no contract.

 

I'd cancel the order unless you are happy to wait nine weeks.

[yellowplum]

Thanks I will take a look

 

The issue is that they are made to order mostly from Italy.  Although interesting when I looked on the JLP website yesterday three reviews were present from May 2021, which means they are arriving it seems. It would be nice if they didn't take the funds and only earmarked them. 

 

I will contact them also and see what they have to say. 

 

 

[Manxman in exile]

Ah.  You didn't say it was made to order - that could complicate things so that the T&Cs about when a contract is made may not apply.

 

You do not have any legal right to cancel if the goods are either personalised or made to your specification.  Depends what you mean by "made to order".  If you have simply chosen from a range of options offered by JL (eg from a drop-down menu on their website) then I think you can still cancel.  But if it's being made to your specifications (eg to measurements you have supplied) or is personalised (eg has your name plastered all over it) then you probably can't cancel.

 

This is the legislation:   The Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 (legislation.gov.uk)

 

s 29 explains the right to cancel, but...

s 28(1)(b) says no right to cancel for goods made to the consumer's specification or clearly personalised.

 

So it depends what your "made to order means".  If you have simply chosen from a range of options made available to you by JL on their website, then the goods are not being made to your specification, they are being made to a range of options made available to you by the retailer, and you can cancel.  But if it is being made according to measurements you have provided, you can't cancel.  Do you see the difference?

 

In any event, if you want to cancel the order there's nothing to stop you trying to do so even if it is custom made.  Ask JL.

 

EDIT:  You can always also argue with JL that the length of time has now become unreasonable and you want to cancel

Edited June 3, 2021 by Manxman in exile

[InoaJones]

Just cancel your order, get your money back.

Place another order when they will have the item back in stock again (if they will ever have it in stock again if it's not discontinued).

Hopefully you will even get it cheaper next time you order it.

[yellowplum]

Not that type of made to order, they are Made to Order when a customer orders them they don't hold stock of them as they produce so many different options and colours, some people hold some model in stock, but no-one else usually holds stock.

I have cancelled them, I found a French retailer that had some Emu items in stock and ordered them from there. 

Interestingly most models on the site state October 2021 for delivery onwards. 

I am are a number of customers will end up cancelling the orders from JLP, they don't offer the range they only offer one model variant and no colour choices.