This report shows that consumers in rural and remote areas of Scotland are often refused delivery or charged more than people in urban areas when ordering goods online.
Citizens Advice Scotland is urging online retailers to ensure that they comply with the law on distance selling, reform their delivery policies so that any charges are kept to a minimum and offer delivery via Royal Mail wherever possible.
The report Free Delivery* is the result of a survey run by bureaux across rural Scotland and shows that 84 per cent of consumers from Arran to Aberdeen have been refused delivery because of where they live.
The survey got nearly 900 responses – the biggest ever response to a survey of its kind at CAS. The full results of the survey are available from the links at the foot of this page.
Due to the high levels of interest in the campaign when we launched in December, we decided to re-open the survey for another month. This closed on January 19th with another 2,300 responses. We are now in the process of analysing these results as well as undertaking further research into the policies of the retailers and couriers named by survey respondents. Over the coming months we will be working with the Office of Fair Trading, Consumer Focus Scotland and Trading Standards services across Scotland to get the best deal for Scottish consumers.
We aim to publish the findings of this next phase of research in the spring.
Advice for businesses
The Office of Fair Trading has created a handy hub for retailers to help them understand their legal obligations. It provides guidance on regulations that affect buying and selling goods and services via the internet, phone, mail order, email, interactive TV or text. This is also availbale from the foot of this page.
