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Distance sellingDistance sellingPosted Apr 27, 2012 12:16 UTC (Fri) by mr_bean (subscriber, #5398)In reply to: Distance selling by tialaramex Parent article: ColorHug drops remote disable
> Someone who says over the telephone that they're not going to return your > property has admitted theft, not fraud
They originally obtained the property by deceit so it's fraud.
Most fraud involves theft because although the goods, money or services are obtained by deceit there is obviously the "intention to deprive permanently" the mark of said goods, services or money.
A long time ago someone explained the difference thusly - if the owner of the goods handed them over with a smile on his face, it's fraud; if they were taken without his consent or handed over under duress it's theft and I think that is a reasonable working definition.
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Distance selling Posted Apr 27, 2012 14:11 UTC (Fri) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106) [Link]
> They originally obtained the property by deceit so it's fraud.
They originally obtained the property by purchasing it. No fraud there. What is fraudulent is that they obtained the refund by promising to return the property, and then refused to actually return it after receiving the refund. That would be similar to accepting payment for a purchase and then failing to deliver the product.
Whether that counts as theft depends on whether you consider the title to the property to have changed hands upon completion of the refund--in which case the buyer is withholding property belonging to someone else--or whether the refund and the change in ownership of the property are two separate events connected by a mere promise. The more consistent models tend to treat all trades as belonging to the former category, meaning that backing out of the transaction halfway--accepting the refund but not returning the property--is both fraud (by intent) and theft (by action).
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