Slashdot Mirror
UK Retailer Mistakenly Sends PS Vitas, Threatens Legal Action To Get Them Back
New submitter Retron writes "The BBC brings news that British retailer Zavvi mistakenly sent out PlayStation Vitas to people who had preordered a game called Tearaway. The company is now threatening legal action against those who have kept theirs despite a request to return them. It's unclear whether the Distance Selling Act protects consumers who have mistakenly been sent an expensive item, and forums such as Eurogamer seem divided on the issue."
If you'd read the law, you'd see that this isn't the case. From the relevant law, which is linked to in TFA:
24.—(1) Paragraphs (2) and (3) apply if—
(a) unsolicited goods are sent to a person (“the recipient”) with a view to his acquiring them;
(b) the recipient has no reasonable cause to believe that they were sent with a view to their being acquired for the purposes of a business; and
(c) the recipient has neither agreed to acquire nor agreed to return them.
(2) The recipient may, as between himself and the sender, use, deal with or dispose of the goods as if they were an unconditional gift to him.
(3) The rights of the sender to the goods are extinguished.
"I'd keep it."
In the U.S., if you receive merchandise you did not order, there are several rules that apply. I believe these are probably the most relevant:
A) You can keep it, unless (or until) the provider requests that you return it.
B) If whoever sent it to you does request its return, they are liable for the shipping cost, and you can charge a "reasonable" storage and maintenance fees for the product while it was in your custody.
Q. What should I do if the unordered merchandise I received was the result of an honest shipping error?
A. Write the seller and offer to return the merchandise, provided the seller pays for postage and handling. Give the seller a specific and reasonable amount of time (say 30 days) to pick up the merchandise or arrange to have it returned at no expense to you. Tell the seller that you reserve the right to keep the merchandise or dispose of it after the specified time has passed.
Keeping something you know belongs to someone else is theft.
"You just contradicted yourself. It is unsolicited merchandise precisely because you solicited something else."
If you take it literally, yes. But you are being too literal.
The U.S. law about "unsolicited merchandise", is a law against somebody sending you something you hadn't asked for, then trying to force you to pay for it. It is considered to be a form of "unfair" trade practice.
But the law only applies if somebody is doing it on purpose. Mistakes are not "unfair trade practices". Sending you something other than what you DID ask for, if it is a mistake, is not an intent to defraud you and so the unsolicited merchandise law does not apply. You see?