Further to the question below. There was no action taken on the store’s part but since the order was completed, the daughter felt an obligation to buy it. However she waited a few months, and now when she went back to the store and said she wanted to buy it, the order was no longer in their computer. Does she still have an obligation to buy? If she buys something else there instead it will not be the exact order, as the mother no longer remembers what she decided to buy.
Answer:
If she buys something else at the store this is perfectly fine.
The store doesn’t care which item is bought; they care about the custom, and not about the particular order.
It remains preferable, if you are buying anyway, to buy at the store.
Best wishes.
Question:
A mother ordered furniture for her daughter and then when it came time to pay, there was something the matter with the mother’s credit card. She told the store she would be in touch to straighten out the problem with the cc. Then the daughter decided she would pay with her cc but she told the furniture store they would have to wait till she filed taxes. She would then use the refund money to pay. Now she has been told that her refund will be less than she thought and she will not have enough money to cover the entire purchase. Are the mother or the daughter bound to the sale? Can they buy something cheaper instead or forget about the order?
Answer:
If the order has already been placed, and the store has already acted upon the order (so that the store will lose out from the cancellation), it will not be possible to back out.
Also, if the furniture has already been delivered, it won’t be permitted to back out.
However, if no action has been taken, it is possible to back out, though Chazal consider it unethical to do so, and some authorities consider this a prohibition.
Yet, for most modern stores the policy is that purchases can be returned within a certain amount of time of purchase, and this is also the law for most developed countries. If the law and the store policy is that purchases can be returned, it follows that there is nothing wrong with cancelling the order, because there is surely no obligation to receive the furniture just so that you can give it back to the store.
