Death certificate copy and 'Vital Certificates' ...

[dazzledsazzle]

So, any death is a stressful time. Usually I'm organised, but I lost the certificate, so ordered a copy on this site. Late that night, sods law, found it. Tried to cancel my order politely with genuine apology less than 24 hours later and got very huffy, pompous outright no and terms and conditions waffle and ?we will already have incurred costs?. Incurred costs 18 hours in ? Their turn around is a month, as if they have even started processing it ? Things happen, a death is hard enough anyway and gestures of goodwill re refunds or partial refunds for genuine mistakes have a lot of currency word of mouth wise. I then phoned 4 other sites, all with quicker turn around (if I hadn?t been so upset I?d have shopped around) and all said partial refunds for genuine mistakes were, as a matter of customer goodwill, always considered/negotiable.

?.. do the words 'goodwill gesture' and ?reputational risk? mean anything to them, do they even know what that is ... do they even care that bereavement is bad enough anyway ...

Which site, dazzled? You can order copy certs direct from the GRO and their turnaround is pretty nippy.

I think you need to get the Head Office address and write a suitably snippy letter. Having had a recent bereavement I can only agree that most companies suck at being polite about loss.

What are the t&c's, I know this is different, but most terms allow a cancellation period.

How did you pay? Is there any way to cancel the payment if it was by credit card?

Arrgh, sorry, unclear title ! VitalCertificates.co.uk .... I will definitely take your advice. Oh and they said if i went on Mumsnet they would do me for slander and libel. Nice way to treat the bereaved ....

I've just read their terms and conditions, do you know when they actually rec'd payment?

And can they confirm when exactly they received your order?

Arrgh i meant Will not death certifcate.... i have lost the plot. This isn't like me, usually I am organised ..

I'm sorry. I know this is an upsetting time for you, but they have done nothing wrong.

Distance Selling Regulations to not apply to customised items which cannot be resold, which this is.

I ordered on 26th June, payment, tried to cancel next morning then payment went out of my account on 28th June Does that make any difference fruity ???

Sorry to say that you won't be able to get a refund. They do state this on the website right at the bottom where no fucker will see it

They will be able to refuse under this

for the supply of goods made to the consumer?s specifications or clearly personalised or which by reason of their nature cannot be returned or are liable to deteriorate or expire rapidly

Sorry for your lost

Yes it does, you cancelled the order before they (or sagepay/google checkout), have possibly received payment.

The point at which an order shall be deemed to have commenced is the point at which the order arrives on the server of Vital Certificates Ltd with the relevant payment accepted on the server of either SagePay or Google Checkout, our online secure servers. Because of the way that we work the contract is deemed to commence at this point and regulation 13 of the distance selling and home ordering regulations are deemed to apply and Vital Certificates Ltd does not offer the right to cancel once the order has been made.

Therefore the order is not valid under their own t&c's, however they may argue that they got payment before you rang to cancel. I'd ask them to prove it however and also prove when they got your order.

You may still not get a refund and although they may have not done anything wrong as its said it's the principal of the matter for me and they might just be in the wrong

For future reference, if you order from the general register office site it costs under a tenner for a certificate and the turnaround is four days

www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/most_customers_want_to_know.asp#Delivery

I'm sorry for your loss. If it's not a huge amount let it go. I say that as someone also recently bereaved. You have too much to be dealing with already without getting into stuff like this, even if you are in the right.

"Oh and they said if i went on Mumsnet they would do me for slander and libel"

So you have threatened them with doing that, and have done it... I would say you are going the wrong way about getting any goodwill out of them.

Fruity, if the op paid using google checkout or sage then they are well within their t&c's

Nope Squeaky, I totally apologised for my mistake, was my usual polite self and got pomposity and abruptness so said i would put the facts on Mumsnet as i felt their approach wasn't nice and left it at that. There are nice ways of saying things. They werent at all nice.

Please tell me what you would have done after a very pompous/very huffy reply to your profuse apology Squeaky - always interested to know/learn how others go about things....

It's not libel or slander if it's true.

Thanks PomBear. I'm absolutely fine with polite no's but you could almost taste the pomposity (spelling?) ..... there's no need, not after an apology and polite question ...

A tenner! They are charging 40 quid ! If I hadn't been so flustered I'd have done my normal shopping around. Thanks so much AnnoyingOrange !

Fruity, if the op paid using google checkout or sage then they are well within their t&c's

But only if they received the payment in their grubby mitts bank account before Dazzle tried to cancel Black

It sounds like they've been arsey about the whole thing. A sympathetic, i'm sorry, I'll see what I can do but it might be to late to cancel let me just check would be much more polite.
they can then pretend to check and say sorry to late as per our t&c's

Fruity, thats so helpful and v v big thank you. Its the pompous reply/approach that did for me. If they'd done what you said re polite approach i'd be oh well ..