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Consumer Rights Online. . .

Whether you are buying furniture from a discount store, clothes from a mail-order company or a watch from a market stall, you have rights as a consumer under the Sale of Goods Act. These rights are there to protect you from dishonest traders and unfair practices and they apply as much when you buy from abroad over the Internet as they do when you buy in your local shop.

Shopping In the high street

The Trading Standards Institute (TSI) website includes a series of consumer advice leaflets covering a range of topics from buying and hiring goods, ordering things on credit to how to write a letter of complaint. The leaflet 'Buying Goods' explains the legal background to your rights as a consumer and uses specific circumstances to illustrate what you can, or cannot, expect from a trader. The leaflet 'Is the trader right?' explains in what circumstances you do, or do not, have the right to a refund or replacement goods. The series also a useful checklist of what you should do as soon as you discover a fault with something you have bought.

Shopping on the Internet

You have the same rights when buying over the internet as you do when shopping on the high street. See the safe shopping tips section on this website for more information.