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Complaints

Most complaints about a valuation turn out to be one line on a report that nobody explained. The rest are handled in writing, from the start, with the same photographs, readings and figures in front of both of us. Assaypost is one person, so at stage two there may be nobody else to do the review. That is a fair thing to object to, which is why the independent valuation at clause 12.3 of the terms is open to you instead, at our cost, whatever it decides.

1. Three stages, and who owns each

  1. Ask the person who handled itOwner: your handler. Reply to your offer, or message us on WhatsApp with your reference number, and say which line you are querying. You get a written answer, not a phone call you cannot refer back to.
  2. Ask for a reviewOwner: a reviewer who did not handle your case. If the answer does not settle it, ask us to review the case. Someone who did not handle it goes back through the listing, the test readings and the photographs taken when your parcel was opened, and writes to you with what they found and what happens next. If the business is too small on the day for that to be a different person, we say so in the reply rather than pretend, and we offer the independent route below instead.
  3. The outcomeOwner: the business, in writing. Where we got it wrong we correct the offer, pay the difference, or return the items, and the correction goes on the record. Where we stand by the result we say so, and we say what it was based on rather than asking you to take it on trust. Either way you are told, in the same letter, that you may take it further and how.

Not yet: No target response time is quoted for any of these stages, because none has been set and a promise nobody has to keep is worth nothing to you. The working-day figures go beside each stage above before the first parcel is accepted. What else is blank, and why

2. While a complaint is open

  1. 2.1Nothing involved in the complaint is processed while it is open. If you have already accepted and been paid, we tell you plainly whether the items have gone to the refiner. Where they have not, you can have them back against repayment if that is what you would rather.
  2. 2.2Complaining costs you nothing and changes nothing else about your case. An offer that is still open stays open while we deal with it, and if it would otherwise lapse we re-issue it rather than let the clock run down on you during a dispute you raised.

3. If you are still not satisfied

  1. 3.1A complaint about how your personal data has been handled can go to the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk, and you do not have to come to us first.
  2. 3.2For anything else, the Citizens Advice consumer service takes consumer complaints about traders in the United Kingdom and passes them to Trading Standards where they warrant it. You can reach it at citizensadvice.org.uk. Nothing here affects your right to take the matter to court.
  3. 3.3We have not joined an alternative dispute resolution scheme, and we will not name one we have not joined. Two things you can hold us to meanwhile. First, we are not relying on the fact that we do not have to: the consumer dispute resolution rules, in Part 4, Chapter 4 of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, do not compel any trader to use a scheme, and they are written around a trader supplying a consumer rather than a consumer selling to a trader, so they do not reach this contract at all. Second, if you ask us to put a dispute in front of an independent third party, we will not refuse on the ground that we are not obliged to. Where the disagreement is about what your items were worth, clause 12.3 of the terms already gives you an independent valuation, appointed from outside this business, paid for by us in full whatever it decides, and binding on us. Where it is about anything else, we will agree to mediation by a certified provider that you and we can settle on, and pay our share of the cost. When a scheme has been joined it is named here with a link so you can check the membership yourself rather than take our word for it.

4. What we do with what you tell us

  1. 4.1Complaints are read for patterns, not just settled one by one. Where one leads us to change a process or to reword something on this site, the change is made on the page where the wording appeared and the version, the date and the change history at the foot of that page change with it. Where it changes how a case is handled, it goes into the terms, which carry their own version line and history for the same reason. We do not quietly edit and say nothing.

Version 0.4.1 · 21 September 2026 · Next review by 21 September 2027, or sooner if the process changes · Drafted in-house. Not yet read by a qualified adviser; that review happens before the first parcel is accepted.

  • 0.4.1 — 21 September 2026. The opening paragraph said the review is always done by the person who handled your case, while stage two says it is done by someone else wherever there is someone else. The paragraph now says the same as stage two. Clause 3.3 now names the law that has governed consumer dispute resolution since 6 April 2026 in place of the regulations it replaced; what we undertake to do is unchanged.
  • 0.4 — 20 September 2026. Stage one now points at WhatsApp rather than the contact form. The forms on this website are not taking submissions, and the first step of a complaints process has to be a route that answers.
  • 0.3 — 19 September 2026. Each stage now names its owner. Clause 2.2 added: complaining costs nothing and an open offer is re-issued rather than allowed to lapse during a dispute. Clause 3.3 rewritten to say what we will do about independent resolution today, rather than only that we belong to no scheme — including the independent valuation at clause 12.3 of the terms, and an undertaking to agree to mediation.
  • 0.2 — 19 September 2026. First version to carry a version line. Response-time figures removed until they have been set, rather than published as targets nobody had agreed.