Martin Lewis warning to New Look, The Range and Selfridges shoppers | Personal Finance | Finance

Money expert Martin Lewis has issued a warning to shoppers of 30 popular online retailers including New Look, The Range and Selfridges. The Money Saving Expert founder took aim at return rights information issued on retailers’ websites, which he said were often misleading about the legal rights you have. Speaking on Good Morning Britain, Martin explained the issue and warned shoppers to be careful.

Posting a clip of the segment to his Twitter, Martin warned: “30 retailers including Selfridges, New Look and The Range are publishing misleading (worse) return rights information on their websites than you legally have. Find which stores to be careful of, and what your rights are.” Martin said on Good Morning Britain on ITV1 on Tuesday: “If you buy something online, which is primarily what we’re talking about today, then unless it is a personalised or perishable item, so a personalised t-shirt, you know, Richard’s got one with ‘I love Susanna on’, that type of thing, or perishable item that’s going to finish, then you have an absolute right to change your mind.

“And you have 14 days after delivery, important it’s after delivery, not after order, in which to tell them you’re sending an item back.

“And 14 days after the point at which you’ve told them to actually send it back, which means a maximum of 28 days. Now as an aside, if you buy something in-store, you have no right of return and there’ll be people with jaws dropping over that.

“Some stores will allow it as part of their returns policy and if they publish that returns policy, it’s part of the contract.

“But you can’t take back goods bought in store unless they’re faulty.”

Martin added: “What they’re putting on their websites, are their return rights, right, if you’re buying something in-store. But it doesn’t apply if they’re faulty.

“Online, by law, you’ve got 14 days to notify them and a further 14 days to send it back.”

Martin mentioned New Look, which states “you can return sale items within 14 days”, adding “No! You can notify them within 14 days and you’ve got another 14 days to send back.

“The Range [says] ‘you need to return your item to us at our Range marketplace partner within 14 days of receiving it.’ No. You have 14 days of receiving it to notify that you’re sending back and a further 14 days to send it back.”

“And we found 30 examples. And what’s really frustrating here, two of those we mentioned, Monsoon and New Look, my team last did this in 2018 and both of those had it wrong then. And we notified them at the time and they still have it wrong now.

“So we’re taking our dossier of evidence and giving it to Trading Standards.”

You can check the full list of 30 retailers at Money Saving Expert here. 

The Daily Express has contacted The Range and New Look for comment.

A New Look spokesperson said: “We thank MoneySavingExpert.com for bringing this to our attention. While our current policies comply with statutory return rights, we have updated the wording on our website to ensure greater clarity for our customers. Customers have 14 days to notify us that they’ve changed their mind on items they’ve bought online in our sale, they then have a further 14 days to make the return.”