Sale of second-hand goods – possible change in the law

Howard Lake | 28 June 2001 | News

Solicitors Bates, Wells and Braithwaite share their advice on a possible change in the law that would affect charities that sell second-hand goods.

Bates, Wells and Braithwaite write in their Spring 2001 Charity Update: “Any charities involved in the sale of secondhand goods should be aware of a potential change in the law due to come into effect on 1st January 2002. This arises from the UK Government’s plans to implement an EU Directive on the sale of consumer goods and associated guarantees.

“The DTI have issued a Consultation Document with responses requested by Monday 2nd April 2001 following which they will draft UK legislation. Anyone interested should access the DTI Consultation Document which is available from the “What’s New” section of www.dti.gov.uk. This contains a comparison of the new rights under the Directive with current consumer rights. Secondhand goods will be covered but the period of liability for any defects can be reduced to not less than one year. The Government does propose to allow an exclusion for secondhand goods sold at public auction. The Consultation Document indicates that as the current position is that guarantees will be the same for secondhand goods as for consumer goods in terms of determining whether goods are satisfactory, the Government is not proposing to take advantage of the exception to reduce liability to one year for secondhand goods.”

About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale. He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.