Category: Contract

Kingsfield on Higher Options

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| Cinema, television and theatre, Contract

This time last year, I found myself explaining to concerned parents at the Higher Options Fair that law students’ small lecture load does not necessarily mean a small work load. Plus ça change. My colleagues have found themselves explaining much the same thing today at this year’s event. Briefly, law students should spend considerable amounts of time on independent reading, developing research skills (how to find what is relevant) and honing discernment and judgment (how to decide what to use of what is read) – these are all important practice skills which they learn in college.

In the US, variations on the Socratic Method are widely used (and just as widely discussed) in Law Schools to teach these skills, and it is one of the driving dramatic forces in The Paper Chase, a book/movie/tv series on which I have already commented here and here. Its great character was John Houseman‘s inconic Contracts Professor, Charles Kingsfield – the clip below is the first time we meet him in the tv series:

The case being discussed in the clip is Hawkins v McGee 84 N.H. 114, 146 A. 641 (Supreme Court of New Hampshire, 1929) (wikipedia; pdf), and Kingsfield’s victim is James T Hart, the confused first year law student, played by Timothy Bottoms, who is the central character in the series.…

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A salutary tale of a mistaken price

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| Contract, Mistaken offers

Best Buy logo, via their site.Via ContractsProf, I learn that US discount retailer Best Buy will not honour a $9.99 big-screen TV deal which it had offered for sale on its website, because the terms on the site reserved its right to revoke offers or correct errors even if a credit card has already been charged. This is just the latest example of a common phenomenon; the biggest Irish example was last year’s Aer Lingus mistakenly priced flights fiasco; and they are in good company: it has happened to Amazon (2003); Argos (1999 and 2005); Avon (2004); Buy.com (1998); Dell (several times: 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2008 – twice); Hoover (1992); Kodak (2002); Thai Airways (2003), Sony products in France (2004), and (hat tip Legal Eagle in the comments) JB Hi-Fi in Australia (2009).

Best Buy protected themselves against such errors by providing for them in their Conditions of Use:

Errors on Our Site
… Errors will be corrected where discovered, and Best Buy reserves the right to revoke any stated offer and to correct any errors, inaccuracies or omissions including after an order has been submitted and whether or not the order has been confirmed and your credit card charged.

…

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From Lefkowitz via lines to Limerick

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| Contract

One of the fur coats at issue in Lefkowitz, via the St Thomas courseweb site.It has become a rite of passage to stand in lines overnight or longer to be early in line to buy concert tickets, or houses off the plans (at least during now extinct Celtic Tiger years), or places in a school, or early into a sale in a favourite shop. Indeed, sometimes, shops advertise (in the shop window, a newspaper, etc) extra-special offers for the first few people in line. Have you ever wondered whether the shop’s advertisment of the special offer is enforceable? If so, you will consider that Lefkowitz v Great Minneapolis Surplus Store 251 Minn. 188, 86 N.W.2d 689 (Minn. 1957) (pdf | pdf | pdf | summary | wikipedia) is an entertaining contract law case (no, really, it is).

The store advertised in a Minneapolis newspaper that it would sell 3 fur coats for $1 each on a first-come first-served basis the following Saturday; the following week similarly advertised that it would sell 2 mink scarves and 1 lapin stole for $1 each on a first-come first-served basis the following Saturday (the image on the top left might or might not be one of the furs). On each occasion, Mr Lefkowitz was first through the door; on the first occasion, the store refused to sell on the grounds that the offer was intended for women; on the second, the store refused on the grounds that he now knew the store’s rules.…

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Identity theft, unilateral mistake as to identity, and wordle

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| Contract

Wordle: Shogun Finance v HudsonI can’t make up my mind whether wordle is a pretty annoying gimmick or a useful analytical tool which produces pretty results. The image on the left is a wordle anaylsis of the interesting decision of the House of Lords in Shogun Finance v Hudson [2004] 1 AC 1101, [2003] UKHL 62 (19 November 2003) produced by Michael Bromby on Digitial Directions. Michael has produced wordles for each of the speeches in the House of Lords and their conclusions will have have far-reaching consequences not only for the Law of Contract but also in circumstances of identity theft.

In the case itself, Durlabh Patel sought to buy a Mitsubishi Shogun SWB from a dealer on hire purchase. The effect of the hire purchase agreement was that the hire purchase company, Shogun Finance [Finance] stood in the place of the dealer, and so was effectively the seller of the car. To encourage the sale, Patel produced his driving licence, and Finance did a credit check on him; when that was satisfactory, Finance agreed to the hire purchase and instructed the dealer to let Patel have the car. Patel then sold the car on to Norman Hudson. So far, so uncontroversial; it happens all the time; and the car seller would then pay off the outstanding remainder of the hire purchase price, and buy a new car.…

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Website disclaimers

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| Contract, Cyberlaw

Image of swimming pool, via SPATA websiteFollowing on from my comments about email disclaimers, via TJ and OUT-LAW.com here and here, I learn of the decision of the Court of Appeal in England and Wales in Patchett v Swimming Pool & Allied Trades Association Ltd [2009] EWCA Civ 717 (15 July 2009) on the efficacy of website disclaimers. The plaintiffs asserted that they had suffered financial loss by relying on a mistaken statement on the defendants’ website, and the defendants countered that that clause on the site which urged visitors to the site to make further enquiries effectively disclaimed liability. In the Court of Appeal, Lord Clarke MR for the majority (Scott Baker LJ concurring, Smith LJ dissenting) held, at pargarph 39:

… I do not think that it can fairly be held that [the defendants] assumed a legal responsibility to the [plaintiffs] for the accuracy of the statements in the website without the further enquiry which the website itself urged.

And, in the next paragraph, he concluded:

When application was being made for permission to appeal it was suggested that special considerations apply to representations on websites. I do not think that the mere fact that the representations were contained on a website supports the conclusion that a duty of care is owed.

…

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Rugby, property, and the interpretation of contracts

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| Contract

Rugby BallPerhaps rugby is replacing property as the Irish obsession du jour. There are many ways in which they overlap. For example, during the property boom, it was not uncommon for sports clubs to sell off some of their lands to developers, in return not only for the cash but also for improved facilities provided by the developers. Just such a transaction was at issue in Hannon v BQ Investments [2009] IEHC 191 (24 April 2009). A rugby club sold some of its property, and the special conditions of sale provided that the developers would grant the club a right of way over the lands being sold to access the club’s remaining property. In particular, special condition 10 provided

There will be reserved in favour of the [club] for the use of the … pitches and the clubhouse a right of way over the roadway having a width of six metres with a footpath on both sides and appropriate public lighting with the location of the said right of way to be decided upon by the [developer] who will consult with the [club] on the Planning Application with regard to the location of the said right of way.

The basic question for the court was whether the developer’s obligation to construct the road arose simply on the completion of the transfer of the property, or was in some sense conditional upon the club putting in “the … pitches and the clubhouse”.…

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