Any obligation to return an accidental second payout? According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), if you receive an item you did not order - it should be considered as a gift - and you are not obligated to pay for it - or return it. Question is, what is the affect of this law on online sales? The example in hand is, a person sells something on a web auction platform. Where the platform owners are the third-party as far as money goes. So Person A sells an item, and Person B buys it. The platform owners, accept the payment, and when the goods have been transferred (lets say digital goods), then the platform owners release the funds to the seller. However, what happens if they send the payment twice.
The party that made the overpayment would have the right to sue you for "unjust enrichment" or "breach of contract" (since the terms of service no doubt provide or strongly imply that you are entitled to only one payment per sale), if you didn't voluntarily return the overpayment following a demand to do so, even though you received it through no fault of your own. Most of the core cases involve clerical errors in the bank account number used for a bank deposit. In general, there is a right to recover an accidental transfer of property to another, even in the absence of a clearly applicable contractual arrangement. As another example, if you were accidentally given a valuable coat at a coat check by accident and didn't notice it until later, the true owner would have a right to have it returned. The FTC regulation applies (as demonstrated by the link cited in the question) to intentional unsolicited deliveries of merchandise (which would always be tangible personal property by definition) to you through the mail. It does not apply to transfers of money, or to the accidental mis-delivery of property to the wrong person or the wrong address. The law in question is as follows: 39 U.S. Code § 3009 - Mailing of unordered merchandise (a) Except for (1) free samples clearly and conspicuously marked as such, and (2) merchandise mailed by a charitable organization soliciting contributions, the mailing of un­ordered merchandise or of communications prohibited by subsection (c) of this section constitutes an unfair method of competition and an unfair trade practice in violation of section 45(a)(1) of title 15. (b) Any merchandise mailed in violation of subsection (a) of this section, or within the exceptions contained therein, may be treated as a gift by the recipient, who shall have the right to retain, use, discard, or dispose of it in any manner he sees fit without any obligation whatsoever to the sender. All such merchandise shall have attached to it a clear and conspicuous statement informing the recipient that he may treat the merchandise as a gift to him and has the right to retain, use, discard, or dispose of it in any manner he sees fit without any obligation whatsoever to the sender. (c) No mailer of any merchandise mailed in violation of subsection (a) of this section, or within the exceptions contained therein, shall mail to any recipient of such merchandise a bill for such merchandise or any dunning communications. (d) For the purposes of this section, “un­ordered merchandise” means merchandise mailed without the prior expressed request or consent of the recipient.
No, this isn't legal. Had you authorized the purchase, then it would have been legal; this is similar to a store credit for returns without a receipt. But since you claim they charged you in error and you did not authorize the transaction, then they must refund the money directly to you (unless you agree to another method of compensation). In fact, a direct refund should have been the default unless they gained your permission to receive it in a different form. Why are you unable to contact the company? That seems like the simplest resolution so this.
If you have an agreement with a company that specifies &quot;you agree to give me something of value, in case I give you something of value&quot;, you have a contract. In order for there to be a contract, there has to be actual acceptance of the offer. You can put out on a web page some contract stating those terms, and if you get positive acceptance of the contract (hence the standard click-through technology), then as long as you have done the thing promised, you can bill them for doing the thing promised. It's not clear what thing of value you are offering on the web page, since it's not &quot;doing actual work&quot;. Them sending you an email isn't you doing something. One thing you could do is block all incoming emails, and for money you agree to unblock emails from registered subscribers. Just announcing that you will bill anyone for emailing you does not create a contract, because the emailer need not have even seen your announcement. This is why e-contracts need a click-through button. It's legal to request money, but there is no legal obligation for them to comply. That will be $10, please.
1.a) Is there any states in the U.S. where stolen property is statutorily (and/or by case law) mandated to be returned to the legal owner from an equitable owner in the above scenario or in cases where the victims’ footings are more balanced? Yes 1.b) Which are they? All of them. The relevant cause of action is the common law tort of detinue: The gist of an action in detinue is that the defendant is wrongfully in possession of personal property which belongs to the plaintiff ... In modern practice, detinue has been superseded almost entirely by statutory actions for the recovery of personal property. 2.a) Is there anything else whatsoever than the law (statutory or decisional) that Alice may plead to bind the court to issue a mandatory injunction ordering Charlie to return the violin to Alice if Alice is willing to forgo any and all damages in return of such injunctions? Alice is not seeking an injunction for the return of the violin; she is seeking a judgement ordering the return. An injunction is an interim order to preserve the status quo. She might seek an injunction that Charlie be restrained from using, damaging or disposing of the violin while the case is ongoing and that might be granted but one ordering the return where ownership is yet to be established would not. However, given that monetary damages are a suitable recompense for Alice's loss in this instance, the court might not issue an injunction. 2.b) If there is, how does it overcome Ebay? Ebay is not applicable to the final judgement. If the violin is found to be Alice's, the court will order its return (not an injunction). If Alice does seek an interim injunction, then Ebay will apply. Hence why I suggest that some types of injunctions might be granted and others will not. 3.) Which states, if any, in the U.S. punish the knowing possession of stolen property as opposed to punishing the knowing receipt thereof? None as far as I know. What is happening between Alice and Charlie is not a state punishment - it is the resolution of a civil dispute about ownership. Most states do have forfeiture laws that might allow them to confiscate the violin irrespective of if Alice succeeds in proving ownership but, again, that is not punishment of Charlie - his loss was at the hands of Bob, not the state or Alice.
The only time it is relevant is when an estate is subject to the Generation Skipping Transfer Tax. But, the exemption from the tax is currently (as of 2019) $11,400,000 per donor per lifetime, so if the expected inheritance is less than that amount there is not a tax issue. When I started practicing law (in 1995), the exemption was $600,000, so it affected a lot more people. All aspects of inheritance are governed by state rather than federal law except the income tax, estate tax and generation skipping transfer tax issues. Otherwise this is permitted under U.S. law in every state (some countries, such as Mexico, only allow a child to be disinherited by a Will for dishonoring the parent in some way or predeceasing). Many people intentionally devise an inheritance plan (in the narrow sense this would be a bequest or a devise, and an inheritance is what you receive from someone without a will, but there is also a broader sense of the word) along the lines that you are suggesting.
This is not prohibiting the resale. You can resell your old box, but you can not transfer your account, and since the box can't take a new account, it is not a useful item to anyone but the original account holder. It is not illegal to make a resale effectively impossible, but you can not ban it under the First Sale Doctrine and [Patent] Exhaustion Doctrine. Accounts are in this case not sold items but subscriptions and don't fall under First Sale but instead are running contracts - and can be regulated as the contracting parties put into the contract. This contract can ban the transfer (for money or free) of the contract.
No, the only purpose of a money order is that it's effectively a form of guaranteed cash that only one person can access. There are no additional protections offered by it. However, given that you are amenable to paying a little extra to facilitate your payments, you may want to consider using a credit card in the future. Provided it's not an all the time thing, credit cards will withhold payments on your behalf if a vendor fails to fulfill their obligations. This means that you're not liable for the cost of the merchant sending you the wrong thing or ignoring your order requests. I've personally done this for several things: Hotel reservation that was borderline unsuitable for human habitation. When a vendor failed to send something I'd purchased. When proceeding with this, bear in mind that the credit card company will want you to make such a claim as soon as possible and to provide as much information as possible to support your claim. If you've e-mail chains, save them. If you've been communicating by phone, write down and provide a summary of your communications. If you have an issue, don't wait a month to raise the concern, do it within a week. Probably about once a year I need to do something like this. Generally what this does is it starts a dispute process whereby the credit company will contact the vendor to get their side of the story (usually they don't respond to them either). After 60 days, the charge is dropped from your bill and presumably the credit card company refuses to pay for the disputed item. Ultimately, this gets you the best possible result. You get your money back and you didn't have to go to court to do it.
This is neither unusual nor illegal, assuming that the buyback price is specified in the agreement. If your friend does not wish to take advantage of the "nice discount" he can decline the deal, and decide for himself whether he wishes to buy shares without restriction, at the market rate. (It would be interesting to know what happens if he sells his shares and then leaves the company. I am fairly sure the agreement will cover this, but requiring an ex-employee to buy shares and then give them to the company could be considered unconscionable. That might be worth asking a lawyer about).