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R
v Killian and Lang The
appellants had visited consumers at home and sold them new mortgages. The
consumers had been told that costs associated with the new mortgage of between
£3,000 and £5,000 would be added to the loan and that these would be
unconditionally redeemable by means of an insurance-backed cashback facility. This was not the true position – there were terms and
conditions with which consumers would have to comply in order to qualify for the
promised repayment; and some consumers were told that they would receive
post-dated cheques redeemable after five years. No
cashback was in fact offered, so all the consumers got were higher mortgage
balances but a lower rate than they would have had on their previous mortgages. The
appellants were convicted at the Crown Court of making false statements as to
the provision in the course of a business of services, accommodation or
facilities, under s.14 of the Trade Descriptions Act 1968. They
appealed on the basis that the case was about the price of services rather than
the services themselves, but the Court of Appeal found that the benefits of
cashback and post-dated cheques were properly regarded as the provision of
services or facilities. {Note:
the Court did not consider the provisions of s.20 of the Consumer Protection Act
1987 which would have more clearly provided an offence.} For full report of this case click here. It is a downloadable MS Word 2000 document. |