Will anyone who ordered one of Amazon"s £7.23 HP iPaq H1910 and £23.04 iPaq H5450 - which we reported on earlier today, see Amazon offers sub-£10 iPaq - actually have their PDAs delivered and their credit cards charged at that rate? Unfortunately, it doesn"t much look like it, and there doesn"t seem much that aggrieved buyers can do about it.
According to the UK"s Trading Standards Institute, under UK law a sale isn"t made until there is a contract between retailer and consumer. A contract is said to be in place when an offer has been made by the retailer, the offer has been accepted by the consumer, and an exchange - either of goods or of payment - has taken place. Unless a contract is in place, consumers can"t challenge the retailer for a breach of contract.
Amazon"s terms and conditions, displayed here, state: "No contract will subsist between you and Amazon.co.uk for the sale by it to you of any product unless and until Amazon.co.uk accepts your order by e-mail confirming that it has dispatched your product." In short, even though a buyer has ordered the £7.32 iPaq and had that order confirmed by Amazon - as many Register readers have - no contract exists between the e-tailor and the buyer.