The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA) and the Common Law: Cancellation of Lease Agreements:

Prior to the Consumer Protection Act, No 68 0f 2008 (CPA) which came into effect at midnight on the 31^st March 2011; the law of contract and the common law covered the issue of when and how a tenant went about cancelling a lease agreement.

That has all now changed since the commencement date of the CPA; and tenants and landlords need to be aware of the statutory provisions of the Act; which now cover the early termination and cancellation of lease agreements.

The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA): Expiry and Renewal of fixed term contracts/agreements, especially Leases. Continued: Section 14 (3) & (4).

Today; to finalise this set of blogs on the above topic; we look at the last two subsections of section 14 dealing with the expiry and renewal of fixed term contracts and once again we will concentrate on leases as this is the most frequent source of enquiry; although the provisions of the whole of section 14 apply to ALL fixed term contracts.

The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA):  How it protects buyers of Motor Vehicles and other Major Purchase Consumer Items.

The Consumer Protection Act (CPA), No 68 of 2008, came into operation at midnight on the 31^st March 2011.

It is an extraordinary piece of legislation protecting consumers from all sorts of previously bad business practices.

We, at The Legal Advice Office, get a lot of enquiries from clients and consumers who feel that they have been ripped off especially when it comes to the poor quality of motor vehicles that they have purchased

The Consumer Protection Act: No 68 of 2008: (CPA): Motor Vehicles and Consumer Rights:

The purchase of defective or previously accident damaged motor vehicles seems to be a hot topic at the moment.

Why this would be the situation we are not sure; but in some ways is not surprising.

As a result of a number of queries in this regard we intend today to go over the above topic again.

Although not really a part of our core business; we often get inquiries about either buying or selling a business; and often give legal and financial advice on this aspect of Commercial Law.

We have this week looked at the CPA; but today we will look at something completely different and will share with you some tips on the buying of residential property.

Your house is your home and probably your biggest ever investment. It helps to study in detail all aspects of the purchase of a house before making the investment.

There are, in my view, as a previously practising Conveyancer, 6 simple factors that should always be checked out by anyone looking to buy a residential property.

Landlords often refer to an early cancellation of a lease agreement by the tenant as “a breach of contract.” This is not the case.

At The Legal Advice Office, we receive emails every single week from tenants who want to inquire about the possibility of terminating their lease agreements.

There are many reasons for this. Some are purely financial reasons, some because their businesses are not viable, sometimes it is because they want to relocate either from one city or town to another or simply to change the venue for their business.

In other case, it is because they were misled by the landlord or the agent at the time of entering the lease eg with regard to a misrepresentation as to the amount of anticipated foot traffic for their particular centre.

If you have valid grounds a lease agreement may be terminated and cancelled in terms of the common law.

 If the consumer has not made the election by the expiry date, the agreement will continue automatically on a month-to-month basis.

Section 14 of The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA):

In our last blog, we looked at the wording of the whole of section 14 (1) and commented on its content and the background to the section.

Today we will concentrate on section 14 (2) of the CPA and also regulation 5.

During the course of this last month we did a blog on Accident damaged vehicles being Defective Motor Vehicles and in that blog we also covered the consumers rights, in terms of the Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008(CPA), to claim a repair, a replacement or a refund of the purchase price from the dealer and/or service provider in the event that the consumer had bought a defective/accident damaged vehicle.

We continue to get daily inquiries about this problem.

A purchaser also has similar rights in terms of the common law, in the possible event that the CPA is not applicable in the circumstances of any particular case. This can occur for example when the 6-month statutory period since the date of sale has already expired.

Consumer Law | The Legal Advice Office

Consumer law advice and legal services especially pertaining to the purchase of defective and damaged motor vehicles and your remedies in these circumstances. Cancellation of Leases and contracts etc.  

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Get insight into both the Common & Consumer Law before terminating a commercial lease agreement earlier

 When one has an issue with a commercial lease agreement and especially where one wants to terminate the agreement early one has to have insight into both the Common Law and Consumer Law.

 During the course of this month, we intend concentration on this aspect of consumer and commercial law.

The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA):

In the above context and as per our opening statement above; there are two important aspects of the CPA which need to be applied.

The Consumer Protection Act: No 68 of 2008 (CPA): Section 55: Consumer’s rights to safe, good quality goods.

The Consumer Protection Act, No 68 of 2008; (CPA); which, as mentioned in our last blog, came into effect at midnight on the 31^st March 2011 has changed consumer law in the RSA irrevocably.

There are a number of innovative consumer protection mechanisms in the CPA which are revolutionary in nature.

The Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA): Section 56 (2): Consumers rights and choices.

We were looking in our last blog at the implied warranty on the quality of goods guaranteed by the Consumer Protection Act and more particularly section 55 ( & 56) of that piece of legislation.

There is still a lot of confusion about the Consumer’s Right to choose a Repair, Replacement or Refund in respect of Damaged or Defective Goods as guaranteed by these sections of the Act.

What are your rights when your vehicle breaks again as a result of soddy workmanship?

We still get a lot of enquiries from clients and consumers who feel that they have been ripped off.

A recent example was of a client who had his vehicle repaired by a service provider in Welkom in the Orange Free State.

 “My vehicle broke down on the N1 four months ago. I had the vehicle towed to a service centre in Welkom with an oil leak on the Gearbox. They ended up redoing the engine which took more than 4 months. After doing the engine on the vehicle and when it was still in their workshop; there was a bearing knock and they had to redo the engine again. I had already paid them R162 000.00 for this first repair and they then wanted to charge me again for the second repair even though they never returned the vehicle to me and they failed while the vehicle was still with them to repair it properly in the first place in terms of their quote. What are my rights?”

Both sellers and Estate Agents should be made aware of this legal requirement.

Last week we received this inquiry.

 “I am in the process of selling my house. I have a permanent gas oven in the house and the transferring attorney is now telling me that I need to get a gas compliance certificate for my gas oven. Is this necessary, and should the buyer not be responsible for this and the cost involved in getting one?”

What do you do when the service provider insists on a repair, but then cannot fix it?

So you bought a lemon (a defective motor vehicle) and gave the service provider an opportunity to repair the defects in the vehicle, or they insisted on a repair, but they could not fix it.

 What do you do?

 Very often consumers, when they have an issue with a vehicle that they have bought, take it back to the dealership from whom they bought the vehicle to have them analyse the vehicle for the faults or defects and have it attended to in a repair.

But what does one do if they cannot fix it to your satisfaction?

What do you do if you purchase a defective motor vehicle from a new or second hand vehicle?

What recourse do you have?

What grounds do I need to cancel a sale?

What process must I follow?

Goodwill is essential for any business and good service is paramount to keeping your customers.

As Jerry Flanagan said:

“ Customers are like teeth. If you do not look after them, they go away one by one until there are none left.”

It is a pity that so many service providers do not give sufficient attention to their service delivery.

You get a real shock when you find out that an item that you just purchased is not working as it should or is defective and you paid a great deal of money for it.

What do you do if you purchase a defective motor vehicle from a new or second hand vehicle? How does the Consumer Protection Act No 68 of 2008 (CPA) and the common law protect you? What do you need to do and what are the guidelines in this situation?

Because of the number of queries we receive on a weekly basis from our clients with regard to damaged and defective vehicle that they have bought; we are once again going to look at what to do in the situation where you have bought a “lemon” from a motor vehicle dealer.