El régimen de garantías en los productos de consumo

Abstract

SUMMARY I. OBJECTIVES OF THE THESIS. The aim of the thesis has been the analysis of the consumer goods sale and associated guarantees established by the Royal Legislative Decree 1/2007, 16th November 2007, approving the revised text of the General Law for the Protection of Consumers and Users and other supplementary laws, which enshrines the principle of conformity that commits the seller to deliver a product to the user without any defect or deterioration and conform to the consumer-user contract. In order to perform such analysis, I started studying the different traditional legal systems employed to solve the appearance of defects in the good sold: the action of latent defects, the general scheme of the breach of reciprocal obligations (under Articles 1101, 1124 and related of the Civil Code) and the error that invalidates consent (under Article 1266 of the Civil Code). Subsequently, I considered the problems that can raise in the system of consumer goods sale; regarding this issue, such problems were examined by analyzing the doctrine and jurisprudence applicable, developing as well an own formed opinion about it. The work developed has allowed me to finalize this dissertation formulating conclusions based on the object of the thesis. II. METHODOLOGY. i) Reading and systematization of doctrine. ii) Reading and systematization of jurisprudence. iii) Systematization of concepts, writing and conclusions. III. RESULTS OR CONCLUSIONS. The study carried out has allowed me: i) To know the origin and development of the traditional systems that were designed in order to solve the problem regarding the appearance of defects in the good sold. ii) To check that the sale of consumer goods and associated guarantees is a matter of great interest due to: a. The different points of view existing between the doctrine on the same topic. E. g. the discrepancies developed among authors in order to determine which contracts are assured by the referred system of consumer goods and associated guarantees (section II. 3. A. c) Other contracts). b. Divergent court decisions (regarding apparently similar situations) in which such system of consumer goods and associated guarantees is reasonably applied. For instance, there are different decisions solving the problem concerning the appearance of defects six months after the delivery of the product (section II. 8. B. Defects that appear within a six months period following delivery). c. There are loopholes that are needed to be filled by the supplementary application of other rules. For example, when a defect occurs in a product due to the misuse of a consumer who has attended the instructions given by the seller, the supplementary application of the Civil Code (for all situations not provided by the system of consumer products sales) would make the vendor liable for such defects because of his contractual liability (Articles 1101, 1124 and related of the Civil Code) to the consumer purchaser (section II. 5. A. d) (ii) Misuse).