Answering legal questions | Rechtswinkel.nl

Questioner

Dear lawyer, Great service that I can ask a question here; compliments for that. I would like to know whether companies that make it difficult for their customers to get in touch (e.g. by only sending emails from such a 'noreply' address themselves) can hide behind e.g. 'you have sent your message to an email address that we do not read', or the more cryptic 'no such user' etc. Can I assume that if I receive such an (often automatic) response to (for example) a cancellation of a subscription, that message is implicitly a confirmation of receipt of my email and can therefore be considered sufficient and processed by me?

Lawyer

By means of the theory of receipt, according to art. 3:37 ju 6:224 BW, a legal relationship between parties in written contact with each other is established or terminated by the receipt of the sent message, whereby it is assumed that the recipient should normally have been able to receive the message under the given circumstances. It is advisable that after sending the email you also send a confirmation by fax or post. Should you require further information or legal assistance, I would be pleased to hear from you in this regard.

Questioner

Thanks for your clear answer. I deduce from this that if I get an automatic message back, my cancellation is less strict in terms of legal validity, but if a customer service employee manually sends me a personal message with a text such as: 'you will and must get to work the old-fashioned way with a quill and paper', I may consider that as a confirmation of receipt of my cancellation. It would also be strange if cancellation still had to be done by registered mail and in writing, in an era in which, for example, insurers no longer even bother to send their policy conditions by post 'because they are in the cloud'...

Lawyer

Considering the recipient's response and I quote; (...) 'you will and must get to work the old-fashioned way with a quill and paper', end of quote. It is a given that your response has achieved the intended result. The receipt of your grievances. As I have already informed you, it is advisable that you send a written follow-up by post or fax. This is to establish yourself in a legal sense. Should you decide to write a letter yourself, conclude with the following: 'Subject to all rights and defenses' Again, if you would like a helping hand in this matter, I would be pleased to hear from you.

Questioner

Thanks for your clear answer. I deduce from this that if I get an automatic message back, my cancellation is less strict in terms of legal validity, but if a customer service employee manually sends me a personal message with a text such as: 'you will and must get to work the old-fashioned way with a quill and paper', I may consider that as a confirmation of receipt of my cancellation. It would also be strange if cancellation still had to be done by registered mail and in writing, in an era in which, for example, insurers no longer even bother to send their policy conditions by post 'because they are in the cloud'... THANK YOU FOR YOUR RESPONSES. I WILL CONTINUE TO HANDLE IT IN THE WAY YOU PROPOSED; IT WORKS FINELY WITHOUT FURTHER HELP. UNFORTUNATELY, I CAN'T GET RID OF THIS TEXT IN THE NORMAL WAY, BECAUSE YOUR SITE CONTINUES TO PROVIDE THIS ERROR MESSAGE INCORRECTLY: You have already responded to this question in the last 5 minutes. To prevent inconvenience, it is not possible to respond to this question again. You can edit or expand your previous message, or you can try again in a few minutes

Lawyer

The best and as advice, I would like to request you to still send a registered letter or letter by post. So that you have legal stability. The more I have already stated, an e-mail transmission is also legally valid. Should a legal dispute arise, you are responsible for the burden of proof that your grievances have been clearly communicated. I advise you this, because in a legal dispute in this case, a reverse burden of proof will be raised by the other party. Hence, this advice.