"Sold as Seen" Is Not a Defence. What Irish Law Asks of a Second-Hand Product Page

Sold as seen. No returns. Some version of those words sits on nearly every used-item listing I look at, usually in the footer, usually in grey, and the seller writing them believes they are a shield.

They are not. Not against a consumer, not in Ireland, and not since the Consumer Rights Act 2022 replaced the older sale of goods rules.

That is the bad news, and it is the part most owners hear. The better news arrives about two minutes later, because the law does give you a way to sell an eighteen-year-old machine with a scratched panel and a temperamental fan without carrying liability for those things forever. It just does not look anything like the disclaimer you have been using, and it lives on the product page rather than in a policy document.

The three words the Act quietly overrules

Section 39 of the Consumer Rights Act 2022 is titled "Exclusion or limitation of liability of trader", and it does what the title says. A term of a sales contract, or of any other contract between a consumer and a trader, cannot exclude or restrict the trader's liability under the conformity provisions that run from section 14 through section 22. Subsection (2) finishes the job: any term that purports to do so, or has the effect of doing so, is not binding on the consumer ^[1].

Read that again with your own listing in mind. It is not that "sold as seen" is frowned upon, or that it might be challenged. It is that the sentence has no effect on the buyer's position. You can print it in bold. You can put it above the price. The buyer's statutory rights are unchanged, and so is your exposure.

This matters commercially, not just legally. A term you believe protects you but does not is worse than no term at all, because you price the risk as though it were covered. Then a dispute arrives and you discover you have been underwriting it all along.

The word "second-hand" does not appear in the Act

I went looking for the special regime. There isn't one.

The EU directive behind the Irish Act let member states do something specific for used goods: allow a trader and a consumer to agree a shorter liability period, provided it was not less than a year. Plenty of countries took that option. Ireland did not. Search the full text of the Consumer Rights Act 2022 for the phrase "second-hand" and you get nothing, because there is no carve-out to find.

So the same conformity test applies to a restored dresser as to a new one. Goods must match their description, be fit for the purpose the buyer made known, and possess the qualities the buyer can reasonably expect.

Where the age of the item genuinely does count is durability, and the Act is specific about how. Section 18(2) defines durability as the ability of goods to maintain function through normal use to the standard "normal for goods of the same type and which the consumer can reasonably expect", having regard to the nature of the goods, the need for reasonable maintenance, and "all other relevant circumstances, including the price of the goods and the intensity or frequency of the use" ^[1].

Price and nature are doing real work in that sentence. Nobody buying a well-used compressor for a fifth of its list price can reasonably expect it to behave like a new one, and the Act says so in terms. That is your genuine protection. It is a standard calibrated to what you actually sold, not a disclaimer that switches the standard off.

What does protect you is narrower, and it sits on the page

One provision is worth knowing by heart. Section 18(8) says there is no lack of conformity where, at the time the contract was concluded, two things were true: the consumer was specifically informed that a particular characteristic of the goods deviated from the normal requirement, and the consumer expressly and separately accepted that deviation ^[1].

Two conditions, and both are demanding.

Specifically informed rules out the general. "May show signs of wear" is not a specific characteristic. "The nearside door has a dent below the handle and the seal has perished" is. The disclosure has to name the actual deviation, which means it has to be written per item, by somebody who looked at the item.

Expressly and separately rules out the ambient. A line in your terms is not separate acceptance. A footer notice is not acceptance at all. Separate means the buyer did something distinct, aimed at that deviation, at the point of buying.

And then section 18(9) settles who carries the argument. In case of dispute, it is for the trader to show that the consumer was specifically informed and expressly and separately accepted. Not for the buyer to show they were kept in the dark. For you to show they were not.

So what is your evidence, six months later, that a particular buyer saw a particular sentence about a particular fault? For most sellers the honest answer is a phone call nobody minuted. That is not evidence. A dated product page with the fault itemised, and a checkout record showing that buyer ticked a box referring to it, is.

Photographs are disclosure. Stock photos are the opposite.

This is where a used-goods catalogue diverges from every other kind of online shop, and where most of them go wrong.

If you sell new stock, one product photo serves a hundred identical units. If you sell used stock, every unit is its own product, and a photograph of a different one is not a picture of the thing being bought. Worse, section 18(1)(d) brings public statements made in advertising into the conformity test. A tidy image of the model in general circulation is a statement about what the buyer is getting ^[1]. If the one in your yard has a rust bloom along the base, the photograph has just quietly contradicted you.

Consider a typical case, and it is a pattern we see constantly among dealers in used equipment. A Carlow dealer in second-hand catering gear lists a reconditioned combi oven, using the manufacturer's press shot because it photographs better than a unit under a strip light. The café that buys it takes delivery, finds the door seal is original and tired, and asks for a repair. The dealer had mentioned the seal on the phone. The listing shows a seal in perfect condition. Under section 18(9), the dealer is the one who has to prove the conversation happened, against their own photograph.

That is not a legal problem. It is a photography and publishing problem that becomes a legal one, and the fix costs nothing but the ability to put six honest pictures and four lines of condition notes onto a page whenever a new item lands. Sellers on agency-built sites often cannot, because every listing change is a support ticket at seventy-five to a hundred and fifty euro an hour, and stock that turns over weekly makes that arithmetic impossible. It is the reason a lot of used-goods dealers end up with a brochure site and a phone number. Being able to publish an item yourself, condition notes and all, on a site that includes hosting, backups and edits for sixty euro a year, is what makes item-level honesty affordable enough to actually do.

The twelve months everyone misreads

Section 22 sets a presumption. If a lack of conformity becomes apparent within twelve months of delivery, it is presumed to have existed at the time of delivery, and the buyer need only show that the fault appeared in that window ^[1].

Sellers of used goods hear that and assume they are finished. They are not, and the reason is in subsection (1)(b). The presumption does not apply where it is "incompatible with the nature of the goods or with the nature of the lack of conformity".

A drive belt that has done fourteen years and lets go in month nine is a plausible candidate for that exception. Nature of the goods, nature of the fault. This is not a loophole and I would not build a business on it, but it is a real qualification written into the statute, and it exists precisely because the Oireachtas understood that not every fault in an old machine is a fault that was there on day one.

One honest limit, because it is the question every dealer asks next. None of this helps with a defect you did not know about. Section 18(8) only excuses deviations you specifically disclosed, so a hairline crack in a casting that nobody could see does not become your buyer's problem just because you were thorough about everything else. A good condition block reduces your exposure. It does not eliminate it, and anyone telling you otherwise is selling something.

The fourteen days that apply even to a one-off

Distance selling rules do not have a used-goods exemption either. Buy from a trader online and the fourteen-day right to change your mind applies, on second-hand items as on new ones. The exemptions are narrow and specific: made-to-order or personalised goods, unsealed media, perishables, dated travel and event services ^[2]. Age and condition are not on the list.

For a normal shop this is a rounding error. For a dealer in one-off stock it is a scheduling problem, because the returned item is not restocked, it is relisted, and the page you deleted the day it sold now needs to exist again. Think about what the URL does when an item goes before you delete anything.

There is a commercial consolation. Sellers who describe condition in obsessive detail get fewer of these returns, not more, because the buyer who reads four lines about a perished seal and buys anyway is not the buyer who sends it back in week two. The disclosure that protects you legally is the same disclosure that qualifies the customer.

Where a marketplace listing genuinely does this better

If used stock is a sideline rather than the business, a marketplace is the honest answer and I would say so on a call. Sell four or five items a year alongside a service business and the established selling platforms hand you a condition taxonomy, a per-item acceptance step and a returns workflow already built and already tested by someone else's legal team. Recreating that furniture on your own site for five listings a year is not a good use of your money.

The calculation turns when used stock is the business. At that point you are paying a commission on every sale for a compliance scaffold you could own, sitting on a catalogue you cannot take with you, competing on a page that shows three rivals beneath your listing. That is a different trade entirely.

Writing a condition block that survives a dispute

Five steps. None of them need a solicitor, though the last one benefits from one.

1. Inspect and itemise. Go through the item and write down every deviation you can see, in plain words, naming the part and the defect. Vague is worthless. Specific is the whole point.
2. Photograph the actual unit. Shoot each named defect, close, in daylight. These are your dated record of what the buyer was shown, and they cost you one minute each.
3. Publish it on the item's own page. Condition notes in the body of the product page, above the buy button, not in a linked policy and not in a downloadable file.
4. Capture separate acceptance. Add a required checkbox at checkout that refers to that item's condition notes, and keep the order record. This is what turns disclosure into the evidence section 18(9) asks you for. Not every platform allows a per-product checkout field, so verify yours does before you rely on it.
5. Review the wording with an adviser once. Get the acceptance wording checked a single time, then reuse the structure across every listing. One hour of advice covers a catalogue.

Worth pairing with a look at your policy pages while you are in there, because a blanket no-refunds line is an offence in its own right, and a manufacturer's guarantee never displaces any of this.

This is not a rare failing

In March 2025 the Consumer Protection Cooperation Network, coordinated by the European Commission and involving authorities from twenty-five member states plus Iceland and Norway, swept 356 websites and marketplaces selling second-hand goods. The CCPC took part on Ireland's side. More than half, 185 traders, were found to be potentially infringing consumer law ^[3].

The two most common failures are the ones this article has been circling. Roughly 45% did not inform buyers of their return rights for faulty or misrepresented goods, and about 40% did not disclose the fourteen-day withdrawal right. Treat those as indicative rather than precise, since a desk-based sweep flags what a page fails to say rather than proving how a trader behaves when a customer rings.

I will admit to getting this wrong myself. A few years ago I told a dealer moving into online sales that a well-written returns page would cover them for their used lines, and moved on to the hosting conversation. It would not have. The returns page was never the problem. The listings were, and I had not read a single one of them before giving the advice.

Conclusion

The instinct behind "sold as seen" is sound. You are selling something imperfect, you know it is imperfect, and you want the buyer to know before they commit. Irish law does not disagree with any of that. It simply insists you do it properly: name the actual fault, on the actual item, with the actual buyer accepting it, and keep the record.

Which means the work is not legal drafting. It is four lines of honest description and half a dozen photographs per item, published by whoever knows the stock, on the day it lands.

Open the last thing you listed and read it as a buyer would. If it does not tell them what is wrong with it, that is the page to start with.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does "sold as seen" mean anything in Irish consumer law?

Not between a trader and a consumer. Section 39 of the Consumer Rights Act 2022 provides that a contract term which excludes or restricts the trader's liability under the conformity provisions is not binding on the consumer. The phrase has no effect on the buyer's statutory rights. It only carries weight in a private sale between two individuals, where consumer law does not apply in the first place.

Do I have to give the same guarantee on second-hand goods as on new ones?

The same conformity rules apply, because Ireland did not take the EU option to allow a shorter agreed liability period for used goods. What changes is the standard the item is measured against. Section 18(2) judges durability by the nature of the goods and "all other relevant circumstances, including the price", so a heavily used machine sold cheaply is not held to a new machine's standard.

Can I sell an item with a known fault without being liable for it?

Yes, under section 18(8), but only if you specifically informed the buyer that the particular characteristic deviated from the normal requirement and the buyer expressly and separately accepted that deviation. Both conditions are needed. A general warning about wear does not qualify, and under section 18(9) it is the trader who must prove both in a dispute.

Does the 14-day cooling-off period apply to second-hand items bought online?

Yes. Buying from a trader at a distance carries the fourteen-day right to withdraw regardless of whether the goods are new or used. The exemptions cover things like personalised or made-to-order goods, unsealed media and perishables. Condition and age are not exemptions.

How long can a customer come back to me about a used item?

Remedies for a lack of conformity run for six years from delivery under the Act, though what counts as a lack of conformity in an old item is measured against its nature and price. Separately, for the first twelve months a fault is presumed to have been present at delivery, unless that presumption is incompatible with the nature of the goods or of the fault itself.

Is a checkbox at checkout really necessary?

It is the most practical way to meet the "expressly and separately accepted" test and to hold evidence of it. Section 18(9) puts the burden of proof on you, so a tick tied to a specific order, referring to that item's condition notes, answers a question a verbal conversation cannot. Keep the order records for as long as you might face a claim.

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