Legal Guarantee of Conformity
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The legal guarantee of conformity is the statutory right of consumers to a repair, replacement, price reduction, or refund when goods - including used and refurbished electronics - are faulty or not as described, which in the EU lasts at least two years from delivery and applies regardless of any commercial warranty the seller offers.
In the EU the guarantee comes from the Sale of Goods Directive (2019/771). It applies to every sale from a business to a consumer, so a refurbished phone sold by a professional seller is covered just like a new one. For second-hand goods, member states may allow seller and buyer to agree a shorter period, but not below one year. Some countries go further than the directive, so the exact rules depend on where the customer is.
The legal guarantee is separate from the commercial warranty period a seller or marketplace advertises. A seller offering a 12-month warranty in a country where the legal guarantee is two years is still liable for faults during the full legal period. Marketplaces that set minimum warranty lengths for refurbished listings do so on top of this statutory floor.
For pricing, the guarantee is a cost that scales with device quality. Expected claims depend on functional testing, battery health, and grading accuracy at intake, and sellers selling cross-border need to price for the longest guarantee in the countries they ship to. Underestimating guarantee cost on low-grade stock is a common reason headline margins on cheap refurbished devices do not survive returns.
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