Returns, delivery and your guarantee

The short version

• Stock items: 7 days to change your mind, unused and unmarked.
• Made-to-order pieces: not returnable once production starts, because they are made for you.
• Faulty, damaged or wrong: we collect at our cost and replace or refund it, whichever you prefer.
• No restocking fee, ever.
• Lifetime guarantee against manufacturing defect, from Mauviel.

Which of mine is made to order?

Every product page tells you before you add it to the basket. As a rule: accessories, tools, care products and most stainless steel are held in Lanseria and dispatch within two working days. Most copper, and every set, is made in Normandy after you order it — typically six to eight weeks.

We do not hold a warehouse of copper batteries in South Africa. Doing so would put the cost of that stock into every price, and we would rather be honest about the wait than quietly expensive.

Changing your mind: stock items

You have 7 days from delivery to tell us you want to return a stock item. This is the cooling-off right the Consumer Protection Act gives you on a distance sale, and we apply it as written.

The piece must come back unused, unmarked and in its original packaging, with everything that came with it. A pan that has been on a hob has been used. We are not being difficult about this: a used pan cannot be sold as new, and we will not sell a used pan as new to somebody else.

You arrange and pay the return carriage. Once it reaches us and we have checked it, we refund the purchase price to the method you paid with, within 10 working days. Original delivery charges are not refunded on a change of mind.

Changing your mind: made-to-order pieces

Once a made-to-order piece has gone into production it cannot be returned or cancelled. Section 20(2)(d) of the Consumer Protection Act allows this, because the goods are made to your specification — and in practical terms we have already paid Normandy for a pan that exists because you asked for it.

If you change your mind before production starts, tell us immediately and we will cancel and refund in full. That window is usually a few days. Ask, and we will tell you honestly whether the order has gone.

If something is faulty, damaged or wrong

This is different, and none of the above applies. If a piece arrives damaged, is not what you ordered, or fails because of a manufacturing fault, we collect it at our cost and either replace it or refund you in full — your choice.

1. Damaged in transit. Photograph the packaging before you unpack any further and email us the same day. Courier claims have short windows.
2. Wrong item. Tell us and leave it in its packaging. We will collect and send the right one.
3. Manufacturing fault. Send photographs. We will tell you what we think, and if it is a fault we will deal with it.

Your rights under the Consumer Protection Act stand alongside this policy and are not limited by it. Within six months of delivery, section 56 gives you the right to return goods that are unsafe, defective or not fit for their ordinary purpose, for repair, replacement or refund at your election.

The guarantee

Mauviel guarantees its cookware against manufacturing defect for the lifetime of the product. That means faults in materials and in making: a rivet that works loose in normal use, a lining that delaminates, a handle that fails.

It does not cover normal wear, tin lining that has thinned with years of use, warping caused by heating a pan empty or plunging a hot pan into cold water, discolouration and patina, dishwasher damage to copper, or damage from abrasive cleaners and steel wool.

None of that is us being restrictive. Copper darkens, tin wears and thermal shock warps metal — those are properties of the materials, and Take care of my Mauviel explains how to live with them.

Repairs and re-tinning

A Mauviel pan is repairable, which is most of the argument for buying one. Handles, knobs and rivets can be replaced. Tin-lined pieces can be re-tinned in France and come back effectively new; on home use that is a job for every ten to twenty years, not every few.

Send us photographs of the piece and we will tell you what is possible, what it costs and how long it takes.

How to start a return

Email us with your order number, what you are returning and why. We reply within one working day with either a collection booking or a return address, depending on which of the cases above applies.

Contact us