maximum of £5 RMA postage refund for faulty items?!

[IanM]

RMA 219968 - I returned item which was found to be faulty, and replacement has been sent. Yesterday I asked to modify my latest order to deduct the postage costs incurred and got this comment by reply email:

i have spoken with our returns team you are only entitled to a refund up to the
value of £5.00 i have deducted this off your recent order.

Now £5 does not even cover the most basic level of Royal Mail Special Delivery! Do some of your customer support staff honestly believe customers should send items back non tracked and under insured? I've no doubt you have internal guidelines to prevent customers claiming excessive return postage, but this is just silly.

In this instance I had to return a motherboard, which is perhaps heavy relative to the full value when packaged. In any case the Royal Mail postage was £8.65 for tracked & insured. I have uploaded a copy of the receipt here:



Could Wesley or someone else please intervene on this? £5 has already been deducted from my pending order, but I'd still like the full £8.65 refunded. Thanks

[IanM]

Wesley,

I have your email confirming that £5 is the maximum that you will deduct and I am getting quite angry with the behaviour of Scan on this. I have had cause to speak to trading standards about this type of issue in the past and they are absolutely clear about this. The customer should not incur costs when returning faulty items, and the customer should use an appropriate method of return postage

Royal Mail Special Delivery is the appropriate method for return for a motherboard - no doubt you would hold me liable for the cost if it was lost in the post.
EDIT: and this is particularly galling as you were willing to pay £15+VAT to arrange courier collection (which you said would be the cost billed to me if the item was found not faulty)

There is no way I will let this drop. Either you can give the refund I am entitled to or I will ask trading standards to intervene.

[wesleyaldred]

There are many different methods which would cost less, Royal Mail special Delivery is the most premium of these. Parcel Force, Parcel Post are 2 that spring to mind which would cost less and would provide insurance.

However, we will not refund the full amount as you have simply opted for the most premium and most expensive option available from Royal Mail.

Parcels2go is another example of were customers can sometimes obtain a cheaper service.

[IanM]

It is NOT the obligation of the customer to use the cheapest method available - Trading Standards are clear on this. Parcelforce quote £10.50 for this weight of package, and only for items up to £50 value.

I think you better cancel the pending order entirely. I will call trading standards now.

Please ensure that my credit card is refunded in full today as I will be speaking to them later as well

[wesleyaldred]

You would need to call Customer Services to cancel an order, I work in returns and do not have the facility to cancel an order.

[IanM]

I have submitted the cancellation request online

[wesleyaldred]

Also as a free collection service was offered which would have incurred no fee to yourself, we should not have offered to refund any postage costs you incurred as these were incurred un-necessarily, this was however actioned without myself being consulted with and I will speak to the appropiate staff concerned over this.

[IanM]

Well, I appreciated you offering the collection service, but unfortunately no one could be available to meet the courier.

As you quoted £15+VAT as the cost of that courier collection service I felt I was actually saving Scan money by using Royal Mail anyway.

[wesleyaldred]

No,

The collection service is free, a charge is only ever taken if a return is tested to be not faulty.

****Please be aware if your returned goods are tested not faulty you will be liable to a charge of £15+vat for the return courier collection costs; in addition to the standard no fault found charge and redelivery fee.****