Written evidence vs terms of service Me: from Europe Company A: from United States of America I signed up for a service from company A. A stated in their written e-mails to me that I would get a full refund when the service they provided results in failure. While reading their Terms of Service I noticed a caveat that stated I would not get a full refund when their service resulted in failure. Due to this I asked company A what this means in regard to their earlier e-mail statements. They replied with the same message stating I would receive a full refund because the plan I was about to sign up for isn't included in the Terms of Service. A's service resulted in failure. Due to this I asked for a full refund. The company replied there was a big misunderstanding which resulted in me not receiving a refund. After an email conversation they ended with: 'We'll get back to you a.s.a.p.'. Weeks go by but I did not receive any response. In the meantime I contacted my credit card company asking them for the refund of the money. I received a statement I will not receive my money back because I agreed to A's Terms of Service. My questions for this situation are: Did A commit fraud? Does their email supersede their ToS?
"Fraud" requires an intent to deceive. In cases like this I would fall back on the saying, "Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence." Practically speaking: the email you received from them is an amendment to their Terms of Service. I.e., your contract with the company starts with their standard Terms of Service, and is modified by any agreement you reach that explicitly supersedes the ToS. Based on your description it is your credit card company that is in violation of its duty to adjudicate chargebacks. If you refuse the charge, and present the email agreement and evidence of A's "failure," then the card company has no grounds to impose the charge on you (unless the merchant in its response to the chargeback can convincingly argue that the email agreement is invalid).
"Terms of Service" implies that you are providing a service. If it's offline, you probably aren't doing that. You can still have a license agreement that applies. If certain types of CC licenses are involved, you may even be required to.
Does (Customer) have any claim or recourse against (Store)? No. The store's conduct altogether preempts a finding of unconscionable tactics. The store's conduct would not be found in violation of Oregon's Unfair Trade Practices Act (UTPA). See ORS 646.605(9) et seq. (I am not verifying the multitude of cross-references in the UTPA, but the language of explicit items gives a general idea of what types of conduct the statute sanctions) The store's decision to decline orders, preorders or money for the product impliedly alerts customers not to grow premature expectations on acquiring the product. Also the store's disclaimer of out of stock weakens a customer's possible allegation that customer relied on a promise of availability of the product. Accordingly, the store prevents a customer from credibly arguing that he incurred losses as a result of the store's conduct. Does it matter if (Product) was available in other stores or just never produced at all? Does it matter if other stores have (Product) but charge more than $N? No. The fact that the store [unsuccessfully] attempted to get stock indicates that the shortage --and hence the failure to supply the product-- is not willful. This implies that the matter is not actionable even if the customer &quot;suffered an ascertainable loss of money or property&quot;. See ORS 646.605(10) and .638. That being said, it is noteworthy 646.683(8)(a) lowers the requirement of willfulness [of violation] to one of recklessness in the context of class actions.
This smells strongly of "bait and switch" fraud: offer a product at an attractive price, then "discover" that the product is not really available at that price. By that time the customer has sunk costs and is therefore willing to accept an alternative product with a lower quality or higher price than was originally promised. Looking at the homepage for ".club" it seems that they do indeed offer different prices for different names. I see "examples.club" listed at $101 while "model.club" is listed at $19,000. From your post it sounds like your hosting company have cancelled your purchase and will not actually charge you the higher fee. This is, as you say, a very dodgy practice. You might want to move to another company which is more up-front about unknown costs for such domains. If you have already paid the £7.99 then you are entitled to that money back. You do not have to accept a different name: that would be a classic bait-and-switch scam. They are NOT entitled to charge you a higher price unless you agree to it. If they won't return your money or try to charge you more then you should drop them like a hot brick and report them for fraud. Edit in response to question edit The situation is not clear-cut, and will probably depend on the exact wording in the company's terms and conditions to determine exactly when the contract was formed. An article about a similar case in The Telegraph had this to say: The legally binding contract is complete when a retailer accepts an order. However, acceptance does not necessarily happen at the point of order. Even the confirmation email may not be an acceptance. Some retailers reserve the right to cancel an order up to the point of delivery. It is therefore important to carefully check the retailer’s terms and conditions (which must be available on their website) and emails – if a retailer simply acknowledges an order, there may be no contract at that point. Lots of companies have T&amp;Cs saying that there isn't a contract until they actually deliver the item, so if they don't deliver then they are not in breach of contract. The company may also be able to argue that its offered price was so grossly disproportionate that it was an obvious mistake and therefore they should not be held to it. UK contract law is based on the concept of a "meeting of minds" where two people have the same view of the contract and agree to it, but this is rather problematic when one of the minds was represented by a buggy computer. You might be able to counter this by showing that they are still doing it, and hence this is an ongoing business practice rather than an honest mistake. Ultimately your only options, assuming they decline to honour the purchase, are to either accept the refund or take them to court requesting an order of specific performance.
History of the case Javascript is a trademark of Oracle since 1996/1999. Anything that can cause confusion of origin or endorsement is thus infringing on the trademark of Oracle. A company explicitly named after a product of another implies to be endorsed, so Oracle sued that company under S69(1) of the Companies Act 2006 in November 2019. The company did not respond to any level of the lawsuit, which meant they did not contest any arguments - the even refused to take the mail1. It was their duty to show, that they fulfilled one of the provisions in Section 69(4), which could grandfather their name. As a result, the complaint was upheld as a matter of law (last sentence of S69(4)), Section 69(5) did not come up to the test as there was no response. The tribunal ordered the Company to need to rename and pay the fees. 1 - Regarding the keywords used by Royal Mail: &quot;Not called for&quot; is applied to mails that would not fit into a letterbox and nobody was available to sign for them. A postcard to get redelivery arranged or pick it up at the post station is deposited instead. If not called for within a specified timeframe, it is returned to the sender. &quot;refused&quot; is applied to mail that is explicitly denied at the door by the receiver and then returned to the sender. Next steps: GET A LAWYER! Whether this situation is salvageable is very much dependant on the specifics we don't know. It is a question for the lawyer employed by the respondent as the respondent needs proper legal advice from a licensed professional now. Respondent might also want to familiarize themselves with the rules of the Company Name Tribunal and if there is an appeals process available so they can ask their lawyer for more specific advice about the situation. They should be honest to their lawyer and tell them the whole situation.
If someone sends you something that you did not request, that is &quot;unordered merchandise&quot;, and under US law, can be treated like a gift meaning that you do not have to return the goods or pay for it. Under the circumstances that you describe, this is not classic unordered merchandise. The vendor simply has to claim (and prove) that you did order the merchandise, which could be done in small claims court. What is unclear at present how any person could, out of the blue, decide to send you the same thing a week later. Innocent error is one possibility (slip-up by either party or some communication error by Ebay), as is fraudulent skullduggery (credit card fraud). The point is that the vendor would have to prove that you did indeed order the goods, so if they want to avoid paying for shipping (if we are still talking about a non-litigious response), they would need to provide compelling proof that you did indeed order the goods. This almost certainly will involve Ebay's tech staff (who would be in the best position to say where the order actually came from). So, yes, you could be sued in small claims court, and it really depends on how strong their proof is that you ordered the goods.
Online conversations are generally allowed evidence. However, EVERYTHING in the chat should be considered, as well as any later actions. Were there later conversations that said something different? Did the lease you signed have different terms? One line in a WhatsApp does not make your case a &quot;slam dunk&quot;. It may only be one piece of evidence in a much larger context.
I can't speak for the US but in Australia this would not be binding. You entered a contract for the vacuum cleaner the terms of conditions of which were made known to you at the time of purchase &ndash; the ticketed price, any store or website displayed terms and whatever was written on the outside of the box. Any alleged terms that were not made known when you entered the contract e.g. because they are inside the box are just that: alleged. In addition, the manufacturer would have committed an offence under Australian Consumer Law by misleading you that such terms were binding. This could lead to a fine in the multiple millions of dollars if the breach is widespread and egregious enough.