Complaints Policy

How to claim a fault in a digital book or an audiobook, what you are entitled to under New Zealand law, and what we promise beyond it.

1. Introductory provisions

These complaint rules govern how to claim a fault in products purchased from the seller, Lukáš Kantor, Company ID 03177009, with its registered office at Milíkov 244, 739 81 Milíkov (hereinafter the "seller"). They form an integral part of the terms and conditions. In New Zealand the seller sells the digital book and the audiobook; printed books are not delivered there.

Where your rights come from. For a buyer in New Zealand they come from the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993. The product must be of acceptable quality (sections 6 and 7), fit for any particular purpose you made known to us (section 8) and must correspond with its description (section 9). Those rights cannot be excluded or limited by agreement (section 43(1)), and nothing here attempts to. Whether a PDF book or an audiobook is "goods" under that Act is not settled in the Act itself; the seller applies these guarantees to them in any event. Where these rules give you more than the Act, that is the seller's contractual commitment; where the Act gives you more, the Act prevails.

2. For how long the seller answers for faults

The Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 sets no fixed number of months. A product must remain of acceptable quality for as long as a reasonable consumer would expect, given its nature and price (section 7), and you must claim within a reasonable time.

Because "a reasonable time" is hard for a customer to guess, the seller commits to fixed periods:

• Digital content (PDF, online flipbook, audiobook): for the period during which the content is provided, and for at least 2 years from a one-time provision.
• Printed book and workshop gift add-ons (goods, not delivered to New Zealand): 24 months from receipt.

These periods are the seller's contractual commitment, not a statutory warranty period. They shorten nothing: if the Act would let you claim later, that right remains.

3. What has been agreed and what is a fault

The book is illustrated: the characters are drawn by artificial intelligence and the uploaded photograph serves as a model, not as something to be traced. Before ordering, the buyer sees a free text draft of the story (a title and a brief outline); the illustrations and the appearance of the characters are created only after payment, and the seller does not promise their appearance in advance (Art. 4 of the terms and conditions). The book is therefore described as an illustrated book made to the buyer's input, and that is what it is measured against, not the uploaded photograph.

A fault is in particular:

• a different name of the hero, a different dedication or a different text from what the buyer entered;
• a missing, blank, misordered or damaged page;
• illegible, garbled or cut-off text;
• a book or add-on that does not match the version the buyer approved before printing;
• a damaged, soiled or incomplete printed copy;
• a PDF file that does not open or is damaged, an online flipbook that does not work, or an audiobook that does not play or does not match the book.

This list is not exhaustive and does not limit the buyer's rights under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993. Mere dissatisfaction with the illustration style, where the book is otherwise as ordered, is not a fault.

4. How to file a complaint

The fastest route: open the book in question in your account and click "Complaint". The form pre-fills your details and sends the description to our team. Alternatively, send your complaint by e-mail to contact@heroofthebook.nz with these details:

• the buyer's name and contact details,
• identification of the order (order number / e-mail / date),
• a description of the fault (a screenshot helps),
• how you would like it settled (correction, a new version of the book, a refund).

The seller confirms receipt of the complaint by e-mail.

5. Settlement period

The seller settles the complaint without undue delay and no later than within 30 days of the day it is filed, unless a longer period is agreed with you. We will tell you the outcome by e-mail. The Act requires a fault to be put right within a reasonable time (section 19); the 30 days are the seller's own contractual commitment within that, and you may rely on them.

6. Settlement options

• Digital book and audiobook: correction of the text, regeneration of the affected page or recording; where that is not possible or does not succeed, a refund.
• A fault of a substantial character (section 21 of the Act), for example a book that cannot be used for what it was bought for: you may reject it and choose a refund or a replacement (sections 18(3), 22 and 23).

If the seller does not put the fault right within a reasonable time, you may have it put right elsewhere and recover the reasonable costs, or reject the product (section 18(2)). You may also claim compensation for any reasonably foreseeable loss caused by the fault (section 18(4)). We do not require you to accept a discount instead of a remedy.

7. A complaint and cancelling an order

A complaint concerns a fault. New Zealand law gives no general right to cancel an online purchase without a reason, and the seller does not offer one for a book; a purchased gift voucher may be cancelled within 14 days as the seller's contractual commitment. Details are on the Cancelling Your Order page and in Art. 7 and 13 of the terms and conditions.

8. If we cannot agree

No out-of-court body is competent to decide a consumer dispute with us. New Zealand has no approved dispute resolution scheme for a seller established abroad, and the Czech Trade Inspection Authority (Česká obchodní inspekce), which handles such disputes for customers in Europe, cannot take your case: Article 2(1) of Directive 2013/11/EU opens its dispute resolution only to a consumer resident in the European Union. We would rather tell you that plainly than send you to Prague to be turned away. The European Commission's online dispute resolution platform no longer exists either. Regulation (EU) 2024/3228 repealed it with effect from 20 July 2025, and it stopped accepting complaints on 20 March 2025.

What is open to you:

• Write to us first at contact@heroofthebook.nz. We reply no later than the following working day, and we would much rather put things right ourselves.
• The Commerce Commission (comcom.govt.nz, 0800 943 600), which enforces the Fair Trading Act 1986, for example if you believe we have misled you about the product or about your rights. It does not decide individual disputes, but it takes complaints.
• Consumer Protection at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (consumerprotection.govt.nz), which explains your rights under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 and how to enforce them.
• A chargeback with your card issuer. It rests on the card scheme rules rather than on a statute, but in practice it is the quickest way to get money back for something that was not delivered or not as described.
• The Disputes Tribunal, which hears claims up to NZD 60,000 under section 10 of the Disputes Tribunal Act 1988. The parties appear without lawyers and the fee is low.

Our terms choose Czech law, and that choice is valid (Article 3 of Regulation (EC) No 593/2008). It cannot take away the protection New Zealand law gives you: under section 43(1) of the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 that Act has effect notwithstanding any provision to the contrary in any agreement.