INDUSTRYNEWS
GGF CALLS ON HELP
FROM INDUSTRY
TO CHANGE
CONSUMER BILL
The Glass and Glazing
Federation (GGF) is calling
on the industry to provide
examples of ‘consumer(s)
successfully rejecting all
the windows/doors under
a contract without any
reasonable justification’, as
part of its proposal to amend
the Consumer Rights Bill
and protect window and door
companies from the ‘abuse’ of
the ‘right to reject’ concept.
Under the new Consumer
Rights Bill, if a product is found
to be faulty, for example, within
a new installation of several
windows, the consumer will
have the right to reject all the
windows for a fault on just one,
within a default 30 days, and
get a full refund.
As a result, the GGF is
concerned that there will be
‘an increase in consumers
rejecting all the newly installed
windows in the house to get free
windows, or use it as a lever to
get money off their bill’.
The Department for
Business, Innovation & Skills
(BIS) currently believes that
consumers should ‘retain their
longstanding right to reject
all the goods under a contract
where only some are faulty,
which protects consumers
who have lost all confidence
in the goods’, (for example,
because the faults presenting
in some of the windows were
suggestive of generally ‘shoddy’
workmanship).
The GGF, however, believes
that this current position is
‘unreasonable and damaging to
traders’, leaving them vulnerable
to ‘vexatious consumers’. As
a result, it has proposed to
BIS that there should be an
amendment to the Bill so that
the consumer may only reject
that part of the product, or
the faulty product itself, and
not the remaining non-faulty
products.
The Federation believes
that there is, in practice, ‘a
significant level of abuse of the
right to reject by consumers’
and is calling on window and
door companies to ‘provide
evidence of consumers
successfully rejecting all of the
goods under a contract, without
any reasonable justification and
on a significant scale’.
If you have any examples of
such, you can help by emailing
the details and a description
of what happened to Brian
Smith, GGF director of Home
Improvement, at
[email protected]
www.ggf.org.uk
To read more, visit www.clearview-uk.com
JUN 2014
5