Thanks for the replies, but the dbs are not offline. I am using the GUI not T-SQL. The database nor db files should be able to be overwritten. As long as I change the destination db in the GUI and change the file names it should restore correctly.

If the database name is changed from what it was when the backup was taken it works fine. So it is not the files as they remain the same when the db is renamed. It's a very strange one.

Again my work around for now is to rename the db(Original db_a)the backed up db rename to(db_a1), restore it from the backup file as (db x).

Rename db_a1 back to db_a.

It seems if the origanl db used to create the backup file exists it overwrites it. Even when the option is not selected. This should not be possible. Honestly this is the case.