@oldrarewhisky - Old And Rare Whisky In Scotland -Broken bottles of Whisky - do i sue the online scottish retailer or DPD

[BankFodder]

What about telling us the name of the company as well? – Or is it a secret?

[BankFodder]

How much money are we talking about here?

This may be difficult because you have left it so long. When I say may be difficult, I mean that in respect of attacking DHL – it could be problematic. Although you have rights of action against DHL under the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 – and this right continues for six years from the date of the breach of the contract, I think lots of questions will be asked as to why you didn't report it immediately – and also the fact that we are talking about bottles of whisky and clearly there may be questions over the quality of the packaging which would then fall squarely upon the shoulders of @oldrarewhisky.

I don't think you need to be worried about the different names of the company at the moment. The most important thing is which company did you contract with? Whether they operate also under a different name is neither here nor there.

You say that you paid with American Express. This is not generally a good idea because there are not subject to the section 75 provisions of the Consumer Credit Act which means that you have to fall back on chargeback – and American Express are not the most cooperative one of the credit card issuers.

Frankly unless you have a special reason for it, you should dump your American Express and start using more conventional credit cards for maximum protection.

You say that the supplier wanted the return of the necks. This is quite normal. Did you return them?

What troubles me slightly is the Scottish jurisdiction – not because it poses a huge problem but really because it's not an area that I feel comfortable with and I'm sending a shout out to my site team colleague @Andyorch who has a better understanding.

I have to ask also – why have you never even slightly informed DHL? It seems quite remarkable that you didn't least of put them on notice about it and this would also be quite a valid reason for them to start raising their eyebrows at what is happening.

 

Just to add – that although returning the necks of broken bottles is normal, if you failed to do this, although it will be unhelpful, it wouldn't be fatal to your case

[BankFodder]

@Andyorch

what set of rules apply when you are suing somebody in Scotland from England/Wales?

Are they the E/W claims rules? Presumably there would be a remote hearing so there wouldn't be the difficulties of either party of having to travel to a remote court.

The OP has been asked what the value of the likely claim would be and so far has failed to give this information. I'm not sure why

[BankFodder]

Ta. After all these years I don't know why I don't know this kind of stuff

[BankFodder]

If you weren't able to provide pictures of the next, how come you couldn't return them?

[BankFodder]

Sorry but I don't understand what you've written above. "We simply got nothing to return apart from that dented bottle" – where were the necks then?

And what of I have misunderstood here, I thought they wanted the necks returned and now you say that they only wanted photographs and you sent them the photographs – so what's going on. If they got what they asked for, then what else was the problem?

[BankFodder]

Okay well it seems to me that you should sue the supplier.

There's been enough mucking around and it's pretty clear that they simply want a welch out of their responsibilities.

Send them a letter of claim. Give them 14 days to reimburse you in full or else you will sue them in the County Court and without any further notice for the full cost of the broken bottles, any delivery fees and also interest on that sum calculated from the date that you paid over the money to them.
That will be 8% per annum – so it will be quite a good investment in today's climate.

 

Read up on this forum the steps involved in taking a small claim in the County Court. I'm not sure of the fine detail differences between English procedure and Scottish procedure but I do understand that instead of having 14 days to respond to your claim, they have 21 days. Not a big deal.

Post your letter of claim here for us to have a look before you send it off

 

[BankFodder]

A mate of mine bought a bottle of Japanese whisky the other day. It cost him 150 quid! He drinks it with coke!!!!!

[BankFodder]

Sorry I thought the 1200 quid referred simply to the broken ones.

Absolutely right, you can only sue for the value of the lost bottles. However I would certainly add on something for delivery costs on a pro rata basis.

 

 

====================

In fact looking back, I can see that the 1200 quid is actually a pro rata calculation

[BankFodder]

Quote

Dear Sir/Mdm

Letter of claim
 

As you know, on XXX date I purchased a case of whisky from you – your reference number XXX.
You have already been informed that the consignment arrived in a poor condition and in fact on opening we discovered that three bottles were broken.

You have been fully informed about this. You requested pictures of the necks and these were supplied to you.

Despite this, and despite a detailed exchange of correspondence between us you have refused to reimburse me the price of the broken items.

If you do not reimburse me in full within 14 days then I shall sue you in the County Court for the price of the broken bottles, plus a pro rata portion of the delivery fee plus interest which will be calculated from the date that I paid you for the items.

Yours faithfully (Hic!)
 

 

 

Check the above – and see if it does the job.

Your version is far too wordy.

Also I'm concerned that you have started a claim with the FOS. You should be aware that this legal action will bring an end to your FOS complaint because the FOS will not deal with anything which is currently subject to litigation.
However, the FOS will produce an uncertain outcome and in any event will be most unlikely to award you any interest payment.

 

By the way, you have now told us that you have already sent them a letter of claim – but giving them seven days. When did you do this?

On the basis of what you have told us, your County Court claim has a better than 95% chance of success plus you will be awarded interest at 8% and not only that, if there is any trouble getting your money from them, then you can enforce immediately using High Court sheriffs – or whatever passes for that in Scotland. In fact if you get judgement, I wouldn't hang around, I would begin the robust enforcement process immediately without any notice to them.

 

[BankFodder]

Why did you submit an LBA on 22 May giving them only seven days? You've been with us a couple of months ready. You should make sure you know the steps involved in any kind of litigation before you jump into it. Otherwise you will only lose credibility and bring comfort to the other side

[BankFodder]

10 minutes ago, Jackmeowy said:

Yes you're right... I thought "I knew it all"... I gave them seven days because this is not the first time I sent this kind of "LBA" to them, I sent one before for Amex dispute. So I mentioned as "this is not an old case I am going to give you 7 days".... Nevertheless, I guess I will give them 21 days now. Thanks for putting me on the right path

 

Don't make threats without understanding what you are doing. Don't make threats without following up on your threat.

If you received repeated threats from somebody which were never followed up, would you take yourself seriously?