liability
Suing an American company from outside US?
<p>I ordered some merchandise fṟom a USA based company via its website and it mistakenly put my login ID as my name in the invoice and shipped it.</p>
<p>I caught the mistake before the items were shipped by the company, sent them an email but they still went ahead and shipped it. Now my country's customs department won't clear it because my name is not on the invoice and the company refuses to amend the invoice or send instructions to Fedex's local offices in my country.</p>
<p>I stand to lose close to USD 400 worth of items due to this and the company will only refund me if it receives the items back which is not possible once it is stuck in customs.</p>
<p>Do I have any legal remedies I can take to get a refund out of this?</p>
<p>I AM NOT A US RESIDENT OR CITIZEN.</p>

<p>There is a good chance that you have some kind of remedy. But, in all likelihood, there is no cost effective remedy to vindicate your rights in a $400 dispute. If it was a $400,000 dispute, the federal courts would provide a good venue to resolve the dispute.</p>
<p>In a $400 dispute, your best shot is probably to seek to have the credit card company reverse the charges, if you paid by credit card, or resort to consumer arbitration, if the contract of sale provided for it. I don't know if the remedies available for a credit card purchase in these circumstances are also available in the case of a debit card, but the agreement by the bank on that issue would be worth investigating.</p>

<h2>I would be very surprised if the contract made them liable for your mistake</h2>
<p>The shipping label is almost certainly automated at their end and, even though you advised them of your mistake, if the parcel had been dispatched before they could correct it, that does not amount to negligence on their part.</p>
<p>While they may not be acting reasonably in refusing to make changes now, they don’t appear to be acting unlawfully.</p>
<p>I don’t see a legal remedy for you.</p>
<p>Notwithstanding, even if you had them 100% dead to rights, the value threshold for commencing an overseas lawsuit is way higher than $400. In the US, each party pays their own costs, it will cost you considerably more than $400 win or lose.</p>

<p>You can start with the shipper, who is clear about <a href="https://shippingchannel.fedex.com/en-gb/ship-to/india.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">requirements for shipping to India</a> (per your profile). Their verbiage is addressed to the merchandise company (recipients are out of the contract loop w.r.t. the shipper), and they are clear that the name has to be correct and the same throughout. From your description, they failed to do what the shipping company requires (which is a consequence of Indian law): there may be a delay or a penalty fee (or worse).</p>
<p>So the vendor has failed to fulfill their end of the bargain. However, you were negligent, in providing the wrong name: so now we get into the matter of comparing negligence, and suing the vendor. The vendor's refusal to mitigate the error would count against them in a court of law. However, suing a US company is expensive and possible impossible under the contract (instead, you would have to submit to binding arbitration).
It may depends on which bank your card is with, but non-delivery is a typically accepted reason for authorizing a chargeback, which is a simpler approach.</p>
