Refund policy

Last reviewed: 8 September 2026

Build A Drone is a trading name of Automated Europe Limited, a company registered in England and Wales (company number 16951017, registered office 10 Smiths Drive, Swansea, Wales, SA1 7GB). This policy covers orders placed through buildadrone.co.uk. It sits alongside, and never replaces, your statutory rights under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 and the Consumer Rights Act 2015.

Change of mind: 30 days

You can return most items within 30 days of delivery for a full refund, for any reason, no fault needed. That is more than the law requires - the statutory minimum for an online order is 14 days' notice to cancel, plus a further 14 days to send the item back - and we offer it because a UK company should make that easy, not because we have to.

To qualify, the item should be unused, in its original packaging, and in a condition that lets us sell it on. Contact us before sending anything back (see "How to start a return" below); we cannot promise a refund for something posted back to us with no prior contact.

Faulty, damaged, or not as described items

Separately from the 30-day change-of-mind window above, the Consumer Rights Act 2015 gives you rights that apply regardless of anything in this policy, and that we cannot reduce:

• First 30 days: if what arrives is faulty, damaged, or not what was described, you can reject it for a full refund.
• Up to 6 months: if a fault appears after 30 days, you're entitled to a repair or a replacement. If neither is possible, or the first attempt doesn't fix it, you can ask for a price reduction or a refund instead. Within this 6-month window, a fault is treated as having been there from the start unless we can show otherwise.
• Up to 6 years (5 years in Scotland): you can still bring a claim for goods that were faulty when sold, though the longer it's been, the more it's on you to show the fault was there from the start.

We will always ask for evidence of the fault (clear photos or a short video, and where relevant the order number and which part is affected) before agreeing a repair, replacement, or refund. This isn't a hurdle we've invented: because these are supplier-sourced parts, we often need that evidence quickly ourselves to resolve the same issue with our own supplier, and asking early means we can act while that's still possible.

Repair is rarely practical for the parts we sell, so in practice this almost always means a replacement or a refund, whichever is reasonable for the item and the fault.

How to start a return

Contact us first, using the details on our Contact page, before sending anything back. Tell us your order number, which item is affected, and why. For a suspected fault, include photos. We'll confirm what happens next - that might be a prepaid return, a replacement sent ahead of the return, or, depending on the item, a refund with nothing to send back at all (see "Return postage and costs" below).

Please don't send anything back without hearing from us first: because these parts come from a supplier network rather than our own warehouse, an unannounced return can genuinely go astray.

Return postage and costs

Who arranges and pays for return postage depends on the item, its value, and the reason for the return, and we'll confirm it with you directly when you get in touch rather than apply a fixed table regardless of the circumstances. As a general guide:

• Faulty, damaged, or not as described items: we cover the reasonable cost of putting this right. For some items, once you've given us evidence of the fault, the most practical outcome may be a refund with nothing to send back at all, rather than a return.
• Change of mind: postage is more often on you, in line with the statutory minimum for this kind of return, but for a larger order we may cover or contribute toward it. We'll tell you plainly which applies before you send anything back.

This flexibility exists because we're honest with ourselves about the model: for supplier-sourced parts, some of what we can offer you depends on what our own supplier will do for us, and that isn't the same for every listing. It never reduces your rights below the statutory minimum described in this policy; it only means the friendlier parts of what we offer are judged case by case rather than promised as a fixed number we can't always guarantee.

Refunds

Once we've received a returned item (or agreed a refund doesn't require one back), we refund the original payment method within 14 days, in line with the Consumer Contracts Regulations. Where you paid for delivery, the standard delivery cost is refunded too, for a change-of-mind return of a complete order; delivery is not refunded if you're only returning part of a multi-item order.

Questions

If anything here is unclear, contact us before you buy or before you return something - we would always rather answer a question first than sort out a problem afterward.