Tech Retailer MSY Facing $400K In Fines & Legal Bills After Misleading Consumers
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Online PCcCompany, MSY Technology has been slapped with a massive $203,000 fine by a judge sitting in the Federal Court in Sydney, for misleading conduct.They are also up for more than $200,00 in legal costs. This is not the first time that the MSY have fallen foul of consumer laws in Australia.

The company who will also be up for over $200,000 in both their own and  the ACCC’s costs in running the case, are big customers of Intel and AMD as well as resellers of ASUS, Acer and Lenovo notebooks have been trading for several years. It is not known whether they have the cash reserves to pay the fine or whether they will enter into a “time to pay” agreement with the Courts.

A major distributor to MSY said that they were concerned about the company’s ability to pay and that they could be forced to pay for all goods up front. ChannelNews understands that the company is already doing that with some distributors.

SmartHouse believes that the company is also contemplating the setting up of a new web site operation under a brand new name.

The Federal Court in Sydney imposed the penalties on MSY Technology and four of its related companies* for making false and misleading consumer warranty representations.


The MSY Technology companies sell computers, computer parts, electronic goods and software to consumers from retail stores in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia.

Acting ACCC chairman Michael Schaper said this outcome serves as a timely reminder that the ACCC will take action against businesses which mislead consumers about their rights.

The ACCC said that the MSY Technology companies made a range of false or misleading representations to consumers in relation to their statutory warranty rights, including that the MSY Technology companies:

do not provide any statutory warranties to consumers in relation to their products will only provide statutory warranties to consumers in a restricted range of circumstances require consumers to pay a fee to obtain a warranty beyond that provided by the manufacturer.

 

In his judgment in this proceeding, Justice Perram said: “It is appropriate that it should be made plain to retailers in the position of companies such as the respondents that misrepresenting to consumers what their warranty rights are is an unacceptable form of commercial conduct and illegal. It is appropriate, therefore, to encourage retailers not to give consumers the impression either that their statutory rights are curtailed or non-existent or that warranties can only be obtained through payment.”

The court also ordered that each of the MSY Technology companies be restrained for a period of five years from making false or misleading representations about a consumer’s statutory warranty rights, including in relation to the new consumer guarantees introduced in the ACL on 1 January 2011.

implement a Trade Practices compliance program display corrective advertising in each of their stores publish a corrective notice on the MSY Technology website at www.msy.com.au, and pay the ACCC’s costs.