The dispute over the sale contract involving the protection of consumer rights and interests reversed in the second instance shall be revised according to law

This is a classic case of legal change of judgment. B claimed that the whole-house customized products sold by A company did not meet the advertised European imports and meet the F four-star environmental protection certification standard, so the court of first instance ruled that A company should refund one and compensate three to B, that is, pay more than one million yuan.

Company A appealed the verdict. After accepting the entrustment, lawyers Wang Yu and Zheng Caihui of Dehe Hantong Law Firm, after three trials and more than A dozen communications, worked together to obtain A complete change of judgment for Company A.

Background of the case

This case involves A dispute over the sales contract between a custom home furnizing company and consumer B. When selling whole-house customized products, Company A promises that the products are imported from Europe and meet the F four-star environmental protection certification standard. However, B proposed that the products actually received did not conform to these advertisements, so in the first instance, it was judged as fraud, and Company A had to refund one and compensate three to B.

Difficulty of the case

There are four brands of the plates involved, which are first shipped from four European countries to Taiwan, and then shipped from Taiwan to the mainland. To prove that the plates involved are imported from Europe, it is necessary to first solve the problem that the import declaration form from Europe to Taiwan corresponds to the import declaration form from the mainland, and the plates used by B are consistent with the categories recorded in the declaration form. The court of first instance held that the Taiwan import declaration form provided by Company A was not relevant to the facts to be proved in this case, and did not recognize this part of the evidence.

Key points of the second trial

The case hinges on how to prove that the product was imported from Europe. Since the import declaration form from Europe to Taiwan corresponds to the import declaration form from the mainland, and it is proved that the board used by B is consistent with the category recorded in the declaration form, the difficulty of the case lies in how to prove this process.

After accepting the commission, lawyers Wang Yu and Zheng Caihui studied the case comprehensively and came to A preliminary conclusion that Company A did not commit fraud, and Company A did not intend to commit fraud. In order to achieve the effect of complete change of judgment, Dehe lawyers have made the following efforts:

1、Lawyer Dehe found that the court of first instance did not focus on the constitutive elements of fraud in the explanation part, and believed that if it constituted breach of contract, it constituted fraud. In this regard, they sorted out all the materials of the first trial, asked Company A and the Taiwan company to assist in providing the certificate of origin of the plates involved and the authorized materials authorized by Europe to be sold by the Taiwan company, and sorted out the list of evidential materials twice and submitted it to the court.

First, in order to show that when Taiwan company obtained the authorization and publicized to Company A, it promised that the plates involved would be imported from Europe and meet the requirements of F four-star environmental protection; Secondly, the plates involved in the case provided by Company A to Mr. B are indeed the ones from Europe to Taiwan. In addition, Dewo lawyers have also notarized all the evidentiary materials formed in Taiwan as required, so that the evidence meets the formal requirements.

2、Dehe lawyer submitted the “Agency Opinion”, focusing on the constituent elements of fraud, and pointed out that there was no false statement or concealing the truth in the process of company A promoting whole-house customization to B; To take A step back, even if the plates are not imported from Europe, Company A has clearly informed the Taiwanese company that the plates required by the customer B must be imported from Europe and meet the F four-star certification standard when issuing the plate order requirements to the Taiwanese company. Moreover, the external publicity of the Taiwanese company has been imported from Europe and meet the F four-star environmental protection requirements.

3、Dehe lawyer still applied to the court to identify whether there was formaldehyde in the plate involved in the case, but the other party refused to cooperate, knowing that it was very difficult to start the appraisal procedure at the second trial stage. This move made the judge waver in determining that the plate involved did not meet the F four-star environmental protection requirements, and then initially resolved the burden of proof that the plate met the environmental protection requirements.

4、Lawyer Dehe also drafted the “Description of the corresponding Problems between the plate type selected by B and the plate type on the Taiwan Import Declaration Form”. In order to better explain the various links and specific processes involved in the installation from the plate to the cabinet to the door, they made a flow chart to present it more clearly, and divided the flow chart into six steps, and expressed the flow chart in words. Do interlocking, logical closure, so that the judge through the flow chart quickly understand the whole sales process, through the text can grasp the details.

5、Lawyer Dehe has formed a written agency Opinion on the burden of proof and standard of proof of “fraud” in this case. According to Article 86 of Several Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Evidence in Civil Litigation, the standard of proof of fraud needs to reach beyond reasonable doubt. However, in consumer rights cases, many courts assign the burden of proof to the seller, and the proof must be beyond a reasonable doubt (almost half of the courts they searched hundreds of judgments assigned this part of the burden to the seller).

Dehe lawyers believe that in this case they have put forward sufficient favorable evidence to prove that Company A does not have the intention and fraudulent behavior of fraud, and B's claim that Company A has fraud cannot be beyond reasonable doubt.

Enlightenment of the case

This case shows us the power of law in the protection of rights and interests, when we are facing charges, how to defend their rights and interests through legal channels. By studying and understanding these classic cases, we can not only enhance our own legal awareness, but also draw lessons when we encounter similar problems, so as to find appropriate legal ways to safeguard our rights and interests.

In order to achieve a good result, every case needs the joint efforts of multiple parties, there are parties willing to trust their lawyers, as well as professional and responsible legal teams.

Introduction to Lawyers

Lawyer  Yu Wang

Partner of Shanghai Dehe Hantong Law Firm

Master of Law from Shanghai University of International Business and Economics, main practice areas are corporate affairs, commercial dispute resolution (inter-company commercial disputes, internal corporate governance disputes).

Lawyer Wang Yu is deeply engaged in difficult and complex commercial litigation and arbitration, familiar with the case process of the second trial and retrial, and good at difficult and complex second trial or retrial civil and commercial cases and achieving the effect of litigation reversal. In the four second trial cases he represented from 2022 to 2023, all of them achieved good results of retrial or complete change.

The representative cases include: acting as an agent for a state-owned enterprise to deal with the sino-foreign cooperative operation contract dispute with a certain enterprise, and striving for a good situation to reach a settlement with the other party by filing lawsuits such as the shareholder's right to know lawsuit; Acting as an agent for many overseas banks to file lawsuits of debt accession and personality denial in China, successfully collecting huge creditor's rights for many overseas banks; Acting as an agent for a state-owned enterprise to deal with the second trial case of a dispute between a shareholder of a company and the interests of creditors, the court of first instance ruled that the state-owned enterprise lost the lawsuit, and successfully obtained the good result of retrial in the second trial stage.

Email:yuwang@dehehantong.com