Analysis of Business Law Cases - Assignment Example

? Business Law BUSINESS LAW Q In this case, the issue is whether the hotel is liable for the loss of Freda’s jewelry and cash. Hotels for a long time have been liable for theft or loss of personal property belonging to a guest. However, today in the UK, there is a limit to the liability held by the hotel if the hotel followed a number of regulations (Sherry & Sherry, 2011: p105). For instance, the hotels are required to provide a safe that the guest can use to store their valuable property like jewelry and cash. In addition, the hotel is required to inform their clients that they have a safe available for them to use, as well as that they have limited liability for those valuables left in the hotel and that they are not responsible for the valuables that the guest chooses to leave in their safe. In the instance where the hotel may try to disclaim liability through posters that deny responsibility for loss of belongings by guests, they are simply trying to gain extra protection than that allowed under the law. In this case, hotels may lose protection against liability under state law while being held liable for loss by the guest (Sherry & Sherry, 2011: p105). In this case, Gullies Hotel provided a notice that limited its liability for items left in the rooms. However, the liability limit must be posted in a conspicuous place for the guest to read (Sherry & Sherry, 2011: p107). Gullies Hotel posted their liability limitation behind Freda’s door, and it is not clear if this is conspicuous place. UK statutes state that where a hotel provides for safe deposit boxes and notifies guests of the box by posting conspicuous notices notifying the guests of their presence. If the guests do not deposit their cash, jewelry, and other valuables in the boxes, the hotel cannot be held liable for the loss. In addition, where the property exceeds a value of ?500, the hotel is not obligated to accept custody unless they have a written agreement for an amount above this. The hotel is, however, liable for the loss of guests’ property where it is due to staff or hotel negligence. The hotel is not liable for the loss, but only if they had notified the guests through a printed notice in their rooms (Sherry & Sherry, 2011: p107). In this case, Gullies Hotel had printed a notice in Freda’s room that they had a safe deposit box and Freda did see it. Therefore, Freda cannot claim any liability from the hotel since it was through her negligence that she did not deposit her valuables with their safe deposit box. Q#2 The doctrine of precedent is defined as a policy that the courts that must abide by principles that were established in earlier cases and their decisions (Duxbury, 2008: p76). In The UK and the US, Common Law has adhered, traditionally, to precedents that were set in earlier cases as law sources. The doctrine of precedent distinguishes civil law systems from common law while giving extra weight to scholarly opinions and codes of law to explain them. Under this doctrine, when a court answers a specific question, this question in other cases that are similar must also elicit a similar response. This applies for the same courts or lower courts in the particular jurisdiction (Duxbury, 2008: p76). The doctrine of precedent has not always been applied with similar strictness. In medieval England, courts that dealt with common law looked for guidance from earlier cases, although they could not reject the ones that were considered to be bad law (Duxbury, 2008: p77). The courts also applied incomplete reliance on decisions made earlier since there were no written judgments. Official reports of court hearings started to be made in the United States in the early 1800s while this happened in 1865, in England. Finally, judges and lawyers got direct access to these rulings and were able to interpret their decisions more accurately. In order for the doctrine to be effective, all the jurisdictions need a higher court to declare the precedent-setting case in law. In the US, the Supreme Court acts as a precedential body that resolves interpretations that conflict or in dealing with the first impression issuers. Whatever is decided by these courts is taken as a judicial precedent. Courts always seek to follow these precedents where possible while attempting to maintain continuity and stability in law (Duxbury, 2008: p77). Devotion to the doctrine of precedent has always been considered as a sign of judicial restraint that limits the ability of a judge to determine a case’s outcome in the manner that they elect if it acts as a first impression matter (Duxbury, 2008: p78). For instance, in the precedent that was set by Roe v. Wade, the decision in 1973 defined the right of a woman to choose to procure an abortion as a constitutional right. In spite of the decision’s controversy, as well as the calls for its repudiation, most judges have invoked the doctrine of precedent in abortion cases following the decisions, including conservative judges. However, this doctrine has been tempered with convictions that earlier decisions need to comport good reason notions, as well as the fact that they can be overturned by courts of a higher jurisdiction. The House of Lords and the Supreme Court in the US rarely overturn precedents, although on occasions that they do, it acts, as a way to signify new ways of looking at fundamental legal issues. For instance, in the Brown vs. Board Of Education, the Supreme Court repudiated the doctrine that it had endorsed in an earlier case, Plessy vs. Ferguson (Duxbury, 2008: p78). The court ignored the doctrine of precedent by renouncing their legal precedent that had made racial segregation legitimate for over 60 years. Q#3 In the case where Electronics Ltd. posted an advertisement for a summer sale and, eventually, entered into conversation with various prospective consumers, the law that governs their agreements is the Sales of Goods Act in the UK (Williston, 2010: p32). The specific governing law falls under the Sale of Goods Act on price. In Andy’s case, he had seen the advertisement and called immediately to ask on the price of an iPhone 5. The salesperson told him that a brand new phone went for ?400, which Andy accepted and took up the offer. However, another customer had just bought it, and there were no more brand new phones on sale. In this case, Andy did have an agreement with the seller because he had already agreed to meet the phone’s valuation. According to the Sale of Goods Act of 1979, where the third party cannot make the valuation on the products due to the fault of the seller, then he is not at fault and can maintain damages action against the seller who is at fault (Williston, 2010: p113). Since Andy had already made an offer and accepted the valuation before the seller had sold the phone to the other buyer, Andy had a deal with him and he had bought the phone pending making payment for the phone. Therefore, he can sue since they already had an agreement. In the purchase involving Brad, who had seen the advertisement and gone to the shop where he saw a phone he liked and quoted a price below that quoted by the salesperson; Brad does not have an agreement. According to the Sale of Goods Act, the price in a sales contract can be fixed by the contract (Williston, 2010: p113). In addition, it can also be left for fixation by the manner agreed to by the seller and the buyer, or even determined in the courses of the dealings between the seller and the buyer (Williston, 2010: p114). However, in this case, Brad arbitrarily decided that he would buy the phone at ?250, rather than the ?300 dollars quoted by the seller. While there is room for negotiations for the price to be fixed in a manner that Brad and the salesperson agree, the seller has not assented to the price as quoted by Brad. The seller had also set the price and, because of this; Brad’s new price is an attempt at negotiating a new contract price, which has not been accepted by the salesperson. In fact, there is no evidence of any course of dealings in coming up with a new price between Brad and the salesperson at Electronics Ltd. For this reason, there is no agreement between Brad and Electronics Ltd. In Carl’s case, he overheard Brad and the salesperson discussing the phone’s sale and accepting the offer at ?300. However, Brad counteracted the offer and told Carl that he had already bought the phone and that his offer could not be accepted because he had agreed to buy the phone for ?300. Carl says that he has already bought the phone and that it is his. In this case, Carl already has an agreement with Electronics Ltd. To begin with, Brad did not have an agreement with Electronics Ltd. for the phone because he had not accepted the offer made and had made his own that had not been accepted. In Brad’s case, according to the Sale of Goods Act, where an agreement exists to sell the goods on a price that is meant to be fixed by the seller and the buyer, and he does not meet the valuation, then the agreement does not exist (Williston, 2010: p117). In this case, Carl has already met the valuation quoted by the salesperson before Brad meets it. In fact, the salesperson has not replied to Brad’s offer, and this gives Carl the ability to make an offer for the phone. For this reason, he already has an agreement with the salesperson because none has been made with Brad. Finally, Dana has seen the advertisement and called the shop and wants to purchase an iPhone, which the salesperson claims is available for sale at ?400. Dana decides to buy it and will pay for the phone once it is delivered. However, she refuses to pay for the phone when it is delivered, as she no longer wants an iPhone. Dana has already entered into an agreement with Electronics Ltd. since there is an accepted offer by the buyer and an accepted offer by the seller. Both sides have agreed to give something in return with Electronics Ltd. accepting to sell her the iPhone 5 and Dana accepting to buy the phone at the quoted price. The agreement exists even where the phone and money have not been exchanged after the sale (Williston, 2010: p122). The reason why Dana has an agreement with Electronics Ltd. is because both she and the company intended to enter into an agreement, both parties agree on what the agreement entails. However, the legality of the agreement is in question since Dana is a minor (Williston, 2010: p123). In this case, Electronics Ltd. will have to show that the agreement they reached with Dana is reasonable and fair. If they can do this, the agreement exists. Q#4 There is the existence of consideration where some benefit, profit, interest, or right accrues to a promisor because of a direct result due to responsibility, loss, detriment, or forbearance already undertaken or given by the promisee (Stone, 2012: p210). However, the consideration needs to be executed or executory and must not be past. Consideration is considered executory when a promise to fulfill something is exchanged for another promise, both of which are in the future. Execution occurs when the promise is carried out in exchange for other promises to be carried out in the future. Past consideration, where a promise is executed independently, and before the other is done, is not consideration (Stone, 2012: p210). One way for a consideration to be valid is that it must be sufficient, although it is not required to be adequate. For it to be a valid consideration, it needs to be of value, even where its value is minimal (Stone, 2012: p214). It is not required that the consideration is commensurate in terms of money to the promise made originally. Nominal consideration is considered enough for contracts, although the courts will not take the consideration’s adequacy into measurement since it is for the parties to make a decision on the worth, subjectively, of their promises. One example of this was in Chappell & Co. Ltd. v. Nestle Co. Ltd., where Lord Somervell contended that a party entering a contract is able to stipulate the consideration that they want. In his words, a peppercorn does not become worse as a consideration if it can be established that a promisor did not like the pepper and that he will go ahead to throw away the corn. Consideration must be sufficient, i.e. it must be acknowledged. However, adequacy, i.e. fair price, does not need to be reached, although it must be sufficient in order for it to form contracts. For instance, in Thomas v. Thomas of 1842, it was decided that a woman had the right to reside in a house for just ?1 (Stone, 2012: p215). References Duxbury, Neil. (2008). The nature and authority of precedent. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. Sherry, John. & Sherry, John. (2011). The laws of innkeepers : for hotels, motels, restaurants, and clubs. Ithaca : Cornell University Press. Stone, Richard. (2012). Text, Cases and Materials on Contract Law. London: Routledge. Williston, Samuel. (2010). The law governing sales of goods at common law. Littleton : F.B. Rothman. Read More