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Implied Warranty and the Magnuson-Moss Act

The promises the law reads into a sale whether or not anyone wrote them down, and the federal act that limits how a seller can take them away.

Informational only - this is not legal advice. These definitions explain general legal vocabulary in plain English. They are not advice about your situation, reading them creates no attorney-client relationship, and the law differs from state to state and changes over time. For advice you can rely on, speak to a lawyer licensed in your state.

What it means

Every state's sales law implies two warranties into most sales of goods by a merchant. The implied warranty of merchantability is the promise that goods are fit for the ordinary purposes such goods serve - a refrigerator keeps food cold, a car runs. The implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose arises when the buyer relies on the seller to choose goods for a specific need the seller knows about. Neither requires a written warranty, a receipt that mentions them, or any promise by the seller at all.

Sellers can exclude implied warranties, and "as is" or "with all faults" is the language that ordinarily does it, provided the exclusion is conspicuous. That is why the words matter on a used-car window sticker or a second-hand sale: they are not a description, they are the removal of a legal right.

Federal law steps in where a written warranty is offered. Under the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act a seller who gives a written warranty on a consumer product cannot disclaim the implied warranties at all, may only limit their duration to that of the written warranty, and must label the warranty "full" or "limited" and state its terms clearly. The Act also lets a consumer who wins a warranty claim recover attorney's fees, which is what makes small warranty claims worth bringing.

Where this comes from

Implied warranties are created by Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code as enacted in each state: merchantability at UCC § 2-314, fitness for a particular purpose at § 2-315, and the rules for excluding them at § 2-316. The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act is 15 U.S.C. §§ 2301-2312; the bar on disclaiming implied warranties where a written warranty is given is § 2308, and the fee-shifting provision is § 2310(d).

When people hire a lawyer for this

Before buying, the question is whether the sale is "as is" and what that removes. After a failure, a lawyer can tell you whether the implied warranty survived, whether the written warranty's exclusions are enforceable, and whether the claim is one where fees can be recovered - which changes whether a claim over a few thousand dollars is worth anyone's time, including the seller's.

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Part of the LawyerLand plain-English legal glossary. Definitions are written from primary sources - statutes and court rules - and each entry states the authority it rests on, or says plainly when the doctrine is state law with no national rule.

If you cannot afford a lawyer, civil legal aid programmes provide free help with many of these problems: civil legal aid programmes by state.

Related free reference tools: statute of limitations for a personal-injury claim, by state, quoted from each state's official text - part of LawyerLand's legal reference tools.