Wrong item recieved in shipping - what are my obligations?

Factual Questions
1

I got a nifty new phone the other day, and decided that damnit, I want to put more music on it, and I’ll need a micro SD card. Off to my favorite discount computer online retailers I browse, and find a 2GB one for $20. Considering most retailers are charging about 3 times as much or more for a same sized card, I hop on it. That was Tuesday. It shipped that night, and the package was delivered while I was at work. I eagerly drove home, knowing that when I did I could have even more fun with my phone. (Did I mention I’m a technophile? I nearly drooled over our new DVD player last night. Yeah.)

So I get home, and find where my girlfriend dropped the package off. Odd, I thought, that box is a little big. I guess they’re not used to receiving such small orders, and so they don’t stock smaller boxes. So I get out of my work clothes and head back to my computer room. I pick the box up and notice it’s a little heavy for a micro SD card. Curiouser and curiouser. So I open the box up and fix through the packing peanuts, and much to my surprise, there’s no flash cards in there. Nope, just a 73 GB SCSI hard drive and a 6 pack of rechargeable batteries.

Now, I’m not the most ethical of people, but really I just want what I ordered, so first thing in the morning, I’m calling their convenient number and getting an RA, so hopefully in less than a week, I’ll have my precious SD card. HOWEVER, I am one curious child.

Legally, am I obligated to report the wrong shipment, or could I hop on ebay and sell the hard drive (where similar items are going for around $180).

How about if I call them up, and report it, but only report the batteries, and leave out the $180 hard drive?

What if I call up and report both items, but they give me the run around and want me to pay for shipping back, which could possibly cost more than I paid for the SD card (Did I mention it’s a heavy hard drive?). Could I just tell them never mind, I’ll just keep the HD and buy a card somewhere else?

Now, keep in mind, the first two situations are completely hypothetical. I have every intention of calling the place up in the morning and returning the items for what I paid for. I’m honestly not that strapped for cash right now, and like I said, I just want what I ordered. I understand you’re not lawyer, I just want broad generalizations and not specific advice.

In the third situation, however, I am kind of curious. I’m sure they won’t expect me to pay to return it to them, because that’s just horrible customer service, but in case they do I’d like to know what my obligations are.

2

I would think that most companies have insurance policies to cover things like this, where items get lost in the mail or delivered to the wrong address. I can’t imagine them tracking you down and making you send the hard drive back, if you did fail to report it- although, when the person who ordered the hard drive calls, and they track the shipment, they’ll know exactly where it went.

Recently, my boss shipped a package to himself from a conference and fed-ex delivered it to the wrong address. It only contained some swag from the conference, like a tote bag and a mug, nothing valuable or unique. When they went back to ask for it, and the woman said she never got it- weird, huh? Anyway, according to them, there’s no way to recover a package once it’s been delivered wrongly, and fed-ex policy is to just cut a check to you based on what the contents were worth.

The only relevent point to that story is the idea that, from fed-ex’s point of view, once a package has been wrongly delivered, there’s no real way to get it back- I would guess that this is because, if it goes to the wrong person, they have no real obligation to keep it or care for it so, once fed-ex relinquishes it, it’s in some sort of no-responsibility zone, like a parentless child, and technically becomes “lost in the mail.”

3

I once received the wrong item - actually, more than one of what I ordered. My attempts to right the situation ended in them sending me more of them plus a gift. I decided to quit trying to repair the situation before I bankrupted them.

4

I doesn’t involve the delivery service, it’s purely a shipper error. All problems are the stores problem. I expect two label were exchanged here, and the store would like to get it back. However they can’t prove Electronic Chaos recieved the hard drive and batteries. They’ll only know that the memory they get back from the other person was meant to go to somebody, which that size memory was to ship to that day. They may be large enough that they relize it’s a waste of time to try and figure who could have recieved the stash instead, and just mark it against loss management without any attempt to figure the point of loss.

I try to fix a problem like this, but I give up if they screw up again and make it hard on me, who is trying to fix their problem.

5

I once got a wrong shipment from Buy.com. I had ordered some DVDs and recieved three others I never ordered. I called them and they told me they would ship the new ones and just keep the ones I got. I guess they couldn’t be bothered.

6

I was once shipped two DVDs and charged for both although I only ordered one. They reversed the charges and told me to keep both.

7

Make one attempt to right this. You need to tell them you never recieved the thing you actually ordered too.
If they give you the run around or screw it up further then sell the HD and buy your memory card elsewhere.
I wonder what you could do if you got the wrong item but had less value than the item you were supposed to get. In both cases you need to get the item you ordered, no matter what.
I reckon the best thing for you and the company is to exchange the items so everyone is made right.

8

I looked online at my order and it said that the item was being returned. Since I hadn’t initiated any returns, I’m assuming that whoever had my card called them up wanting their hard drive.

I tried calling them four times, and each time the system hang up on me.

I shot off an email to the customer service explaining the situation, and letting them know I did call several times, but apparently nobody wanted to talk to me. Hopefully I’ll get a reply from them soon.

9

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/general/wrong.htm

FTC, so I assume that is pretty valid. Not sure if they would actually send you the item you purchased though, but it sounds like you could make them give it to you. Of course the moral thing to do is to email them, and send the item back COD (this may be only for unsolicited merchandise, but the site doesn’t elaborate.)

10

A while back I ordered 2 new seats for my Breuer chairs, and the supplier sent me ones of the wrong color. I phoned them and explained the problem, and told them if they’d put a shipping label in with the correct ones I’d send the wrong ones back. They promptly shipped the proper seats, but not the shipping label, so I’ve still got the other ones sitting in my closet a year later.

11

Pretty sure that is not covered here, as that usually applies to items that are sent to you (without an order) in which they then request payment for said items. (sent on ‘trial’ basis and you never requested… ).

the OP ordered something and got the wrong item… that is a different matter.

12

Yeah I thought it might be something like that, hence the part in the parentheses. Didn’t find anything else that came close to describing the exact situation.