Argos to refund more than £500,000 to 114,000 customers after breaking extended warranty rules
ARGOS will refund over £500,000 in total to 114,000 customers after breaking extended warranty rules.
For more than a year, the high street giant failed to remind customers to shop around for an extended warranty deal, according to the competitions watchdog.
Affected customers will get the refunds paid in e-card vouchers to spend in store, according to the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA).
The retailer owes a total of £570,010 to customers, and each customer will get a fiver.
Argos has said the e-card vouchers can be spent both in store and online, but they have a 12-month expiry date.
The shop will be contacting affected customers by email over the next few weeks.
What is an extended warranty?
WARRANTIES offer you protection if something goes wrong with a new purchase and are different to guarantees - but you might not need to buy one at all.
Product guarantees are usually provided for free by a retailer, whereas a warranty is often paid for and lasts longer than a guarantee.
There are both standard and extended warranties, with the latter being an additional protection on top of the standard agreement.
But you don’t legally have to buy a warranty at all, and you still have statutory rights in other ways due to the Consumer Rights Act 2015.
? explains this may include a refund, repair or replacement, if you find your product is faulty within the first six months of owning it.
If a fault develops after the first six months, the burden is on you to prove that the product was faulty at the time the goods were delivered to you.
Customers have up to six years to make a claim for an item they’ve bought, or five years in Scotland.
If you have home contents insurance, your product may also be covered through this - but read the small print of your policy carefully.
Before you think about paying for an extended warranty, remember that manufacturers also often guarantee their goods for up to 12 months.
Check the terms and conditions of your purchase carefully.
If you do decide to buy an extended warranty, make sure you shop around for the cheapest deal.
suggests using for domestic electrical goods.
Extended warranties offer people the chance to pay for more protection when buying products, over and above any standard guarantee.
In 2012, Argos signed a legal agreement promising to provide a link to a price comparison website every time it offers an extended warranty for domestic electrical products online.
This is so that customers can compare the price of the warranty elsewhere, and potentially get a better deal.
But the CMA found that the retailer was not displaying this link - and Argos admitted it hadn't been for more than a year.
In total, over 400,000 extended warranties were sold without a link, meaning around 114,000 customers may have been able to save cash by shopping elsewhere.
Affected customers will also have the option to cancel their extended warranty they bought from Argos for free.
Argos has now promised to include a link to a price comparison site when selling extended warranties from now on and would carry out regular checks to avoid a breach happening again.
The CMA said it will consider "formal enforcement action" if Argos is caught breaching the rules again.
Adam Land, CMA senior director of remedies business and financial analysis, said: "It’s only right that Argos is now taking steps to fix its error and make sure that something similar doesn’t happen in the future."
An Argos spokesperson said: “We’re contacting customers to apologise after an error with our website meant our link to a comparison website was not as accessible to customers as it should have been when purchasing Argos Care product insurance.
"We’ve put this right and customers affected can continue with their extra protection or cancel and receive a refund.”
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Argos has remained closed over the third national lockdown due to the Covid crisis, as it is classed as a non-essential retailer.
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Standalone stores across England are closed for shoppers to buy items in-stores, but you can still use them for click and collect.
However, non-essential retail can reopen on April 12 - which includes Argos.