is it a serious issue here in united kingdom?

Question

i bought a tinned powdered milk from a shop and when i got home i found out it expired in 2005. can lawers handle this case

Answer 1

I think you would be better served to go back to the shop and ask for a refund or a replacement tin. If you are concerned that the shop may make a habit of this ask at your local council how to go about reporting the matter.

In the UK a lawyer can get you compensation for the damaged you suffered. Unless you consumed some of the product and afterwards became seriously ill as a result of it, which would be very hard to prove, the only damage you suffered was you had to get another tin, maybe take an extra trip to the shop. Not exactly worthy of a high court claim.

However insensed you feel about it at the moment, it's actually a really trivial matter. Though you could try writing to the manufacturers, they will often send a voucher or something just in the interests of customer relations.

Answer 2

Ok the best before date applies to all foods who have a expiry within the year. However even if the milk you purchased was expired in 2005 lawyers may not handle this case due to negligance or minformation.

Reasons Lawyers may not handle your case are

- You can get a refund from shop
- Shop can agree to terms of incomplete information for instance they were not aware that this product was out of date
- Shop may have been tooken over by a new owner and used existing stock he may have not known this item was expiring as he just purchased the premises
- You can go back to the shop and get another one by refunding your money for this


However you can get a lawyer for this case are
- You have been to the same shop before and this has happened
- There are health and saftey issues regarding the shop
- The shop has breeched a code of trading standards act
- The shop has other items simmilar to the one you have purchased and they expire 0r 2005 or earlier date


This is a seroius issue in the uk for small shops. However if they deal with hundreds of items they may make minute mistakes. The UK has good standards on food although some shop owners may not comply to this standards. In extreme cases the health and safety team pay a visit to low standards shop who abuse consumer rights by supplying items that have expired.

In any case if you carry out a case against the shop for a item that is expired it will take very long. Also most of the evidence will need to be gathered and the expiry of items has to be consitent if this is a one of and only very few items on the shop are being sold that have expire the court will give the shop owner the benefit of the doubt.

In conclusion lawyers may be able to handle your case this mainly depends on the severity of the matter and whether or not the shop has a history of selling expired items.

Hope I helped Thank you