This cannot be right. They are described by their counsel in submissions as risk takers, business minded and profit seeking. The first, second and third plaintiffs have been friends for a long time and are bound by common business interests. Scorpio: 13/01/20 01:42 I want at least one for personal use 2 would be good coz my gf needs one too any more than that would be a bonus ;-), Scorpio: 13/01/20 01:43 anyway, I dont mind buying over if you have frens who want to sell buy at twice the price!! Rather they assist in explaining how the common law has incrementally and cautiously allowed and continues to mould exceptions to the application of the objective theory of contracts. The fact that the acceptance was automatically generated by a computer software cannot in any manner exonerate the defendant from responsibility. Where common mistake is pleaded, the presence of agreement is admitted. Soon after, the second, third and fifth plaintiffs took their claims to the media. 82 The plaintiffs strenuously opposed the defendants amendments principally on the ground it was made at a late juncture.
chwee kin keong v digilandmall high court This was presumably to render the training more lifelike.
FEATURE - Law Gazette In accordance with s15(1) of the ETA, acceptance would be effective the moment the offer enters that node of the network outside the control of the originator. There are in this connection two schools of thought. 13 The first plaintiff, Chwee Kin Keong, is 29 years old. He appears to have been in constant communication with the second plaintiff and to have received and read the mass e-mail from the first plaintiff after he placed his first purchase order. The appellants featured prominently because of the size of their orders. In my view this further undermines the essence of the plaintiffs case that they never contemplated that the pricing was a mistake. Not all one-sided transactions or bargains are improper. They are tainted and unenforceable. Chwee Kin Keong v Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd [2005] 1 SLR 502: [2005] SGCA 2 Context: This Case deals with the issue of unilateral mistake. 126 The Australian courts appear to have relied on the views of Lord DenningMR in Solle v Butcher to establish a wholly different doctrinal approach to mistake and have purportedly applied a fused concept of law and equity to the law on mistake. by the earlier decision of Chwee Kin Keong v Digilandmall.com [2005] 1 SLR(R) 502, where the Court of Appeal recognised the doctrine of unilateral mistake in equity, departing from the English position in Great Peace Shipping Ltd v Tsavliris Salvage (International) Ltd [2003] QB 679; [2002] 3 WLR 1617; [2002] 4 All ER 689. (c) the need to reach commercially sensible solutions while respecting traditional principles applicable to instances of genuine error or mistake. Thus, while the idea of snapping up may well apply in cases one side is aware of the other sides error, I do not think it can be applied literally in the constructive knowledge cases. The defendant has expressly pleaded unilateral mistake. A steady stream of decisions from common law courts indicate a measured but nevertheless distinctly incremental willingness to extend the scope of the exception to not just actual knowledge, but deemed or constructive knowledge as well. His evidence pertaining to the material points of knowledge and his communications with the other plaintiffs lacked credibility. 54 The fourth plaintiff admits that he had entertained the idea at the material time that the price posting could have been an error. It is essential that the law be perceived as embodying rationality and fairness while respecting the commercial imperative of certainty. The other school of thought views the approach outlined earlier with considerable scepticism. The caption in each of the e-mails Successful Purchase Confirmation from HP online says it all. Counsel however contends that even if this e-mail were to be read literally, this should not affect the first plaintiffs own purchase that had taken place an hour earlier. Cases of fraud and misrepresentation, and undue influence, are all catered for under other existing and uncontentious equitable rules. As this is a critical issue, it is imperative that each of their positions be carefully evaluated. There is no merit at all in this contention. The defendant programmed the software. It is pertinent to note that she placed orders for 32 laser printers including 20 units she ordered on behalf of her sister. Despite the general views expressed in Taylor v Johnson (1983) 151CLR 422 on equitable mistake, it seems to be generally accepted in Australia as well, that this class of cases requires special mention and consideration. Vincent. The e-mail was given a high importance priority and captioned go load it now!!. June Proctor, 1997, p. 13. 91 There is no real conundrum as to whether contractual principles apply to Internet contracts. . The E-Mail Acceptance Rule. A real product number HP9660A was inserted in the new template as the prototype for which fictional prices were to be changed on the three relevant websites. 74 Under product description on each webpage, instead of the actual description of the laser printer which in this case should have been HP9660A Color LaserJet 4600, only the numerals 55 appeared: this was the result of Samuel Teos earlier inadvertent input. I cannot accept that. 146 A purchaser in a case of apparent unilateral mistake, who purchases for genuine own use a product, may not always be viewed as guilty of engaging in snapping up. Singapore Court of Appeal.
CISG-online | CISG-online.org 136 First, it was suggested that no contracts had been formed as all the contracts were subject to availability and that a failure to adhere to the directive call to enquire prevented the contracts from coming into existence. His revelation that he did not know if this is an error or whether HP will honour this purchase, not to mention the articulation of his hope that by the time you see this email, the price is still at S$66.00 coz they might change it anytime, are all compelling in reflecting his state of mind and awareness that an error had occurred. Lord Phillips of Worth MatraversMR observed in a withering analysis at [156], [157], [160] and [161]: Thus the premise of the equitys intrusion into the effects of the common law is that the common law rule in question is seen in the particular case to work injustice, and for some reason the common law cannot cure itself. The later the amendment, the greater the adverse consequences. Article24 of the Convention states: For the purposes of this Part of the Convention, an offer, declaration of acceptance or any other indication of intention reaches the addressee when it is made orally to him or delivered by any other means to him personally, to his place of business or mailing address or, if he does not have a place of business or mailing address, to his habitual residence. 142 The plaintiffs were bound by personal relationships as well as past and present common commercial interests. 48 The third plaintiff annexed to his affidavit the transcript of the Channel NewsAsia report where he was quoted. 78 In a Channel NewsAsia report datelined 15January 2003, it was reported that: Two of the customers, Mark Yeow and Malcolm Tan, have already spoken to their lawyers. Case name. To that extent, his evidence that he subsequently dismissed the notion altogether is unacceptable. http://www.epinions.com/HP_Color_LaserJet_4600_Series_Printer_Printers. The argument is that, despite appearances, there is no real correspondence of offer and acceptance and that therefore the transaction must necessarily be void. With reference to the judgement, the case explores pricing mistakes by online stores. Ltd. Yeo Tiong Min* I. I do not know if this is an error or whether HP will honour this purchase. As with any normal contract, Internet merchants have to be cautious how they present an advertisement, since this determines whether the advertisement will be construed as an invitation to treat or a unilateral contract.
Chwee Kin Keong and Others v Pte Ltd PDF fileChwee Kin Has an agreement been reached or not? I invited both parties to indicate if they wished to amend their pleadings. He offered to buy a laser printer from Desmond at double the price, that is $132. Nor is it disputed that Samuel Teo, or any of the other employees of the defendant, was unaware at all material times of the dramatic chain of events so unwittingly initiated by the former. The neutral citation of the case Chwee Kin Keong and others v Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd is as follows: This citation tells us that this was the 71st case in 2004 decided in the Singapore High Court. v . 24 While the first plaintiff conceded that he had communicated to the second and third plaintiffs the existence of a good deal, he maintained he did not discuss the possibility of the pricing being a mistake. Yong Pung HowCJ in Tribune Investment Trust Inc v Soosan Trading Co Ltd [2000] 3 SLR 405 at [40] opined: [T]he function of the court is to try as far as practical experience allows, to ensure that the reasonable expectations of honest men are not disappointed. This constituted more than a quarter of the total number of laser printers ordered. Given that he left everything in the third plaintiffs hands, his legal position is, to that extent, identical to the third plaintiffs. In Chwee Kin Keong v . He is 32 years old and conducts his own network marketing business. 59 Upon duly accessing the HP website through the hyperlink sent to him by the second plaintiff, the fifth plaintiff ascertained that the laser printer was priced at $66.
Chwee Kin Keong Vs | PDF - Scribd I reject this. 134 It is not really in issue that contracts can be effectively concluded over the Internet and that programmed computers sending out automated responses can bind the sender. 129 The careful analysis of case law undertaken by that court yields a cogent and forceful argument that Lord DenningMR was plainly attempting to side-step Bell v Lever in a naked attempt to achieve equitable justice in the face of the poverty of the common law. The leading Canadian decision in this area is the case of McMaster University v Wilchar Construction Ltd (1971) 22DLR(3d) 9 which, incidentally, was cited with approval by the Australian High Court in Taylor v Johnson. Basic principles of contract law continue to prevail in contracts made on the Internet. Limit orders: order to be executed only when the desired price is available. It is postulated by many of the leading treatises that equity has a broad church incorporating a more elastic approach and a court of equity may rescind a contract, award damages or, in limited circumstances, fashion a remedy, to suit the justice of the matter. You may find the status of your order by calling us at (phone number given) Special instructions: Please call to advise delivery date and time. 150 The plaintiffs have contended that this court ought to follow the decision in Taylor v Johnson and hold that the contract is not void under common law but voidable only in equity. Chwee Kin Keong v Digilandmall.com (2005) - Singaporean case 3d printers sold for $66 instead of $3,800. 128 The most significant judicial pronouncement supporting this view emanates from the recent English Court of Appeal in Great Peace Shipping Ltd v Tsavliris Salvage (International) Ltd [2003] QB 679, a case of common mistake. The e-mails had all the characteristics of an unequivocal acceptance. It appears there were a series of sms messages between them and at least a few telephone discussions while the purchases were being effected. Thus the task of ascertaining whether the parties have reached agreement as to the terms of a contract can involve quite a complex amalgam of the objective and the subjective and involve the application of a principle that bears close comparison with the doctrine of estoppel. Rajah J.C. in the Singapore High Court in Chwee Kin Keong v. Digilandmall.com Pte. While I agree with what Madam Justice Mclachlin said so far as it goes, I do not believe she intended to imply that there must be a conscious taking advantage by one party of the other in all cases. Consideration was less than executory and non-existent. There are two types of orders relevant: market orders and limit orders. In this case we have heard full argument, which has provided what we believe has been the first opportunity in this court for a full and mature consideration of the relation between Bell v Lever Bros Ltd [1932] AC 161 and Solle v Butcher. How could one seek to calculate the profit margin before finding out the true market price of the laser printer? Adopting an objective standard, executory contracts have in fact been entered into and concluded between the parties. 26 I respectfully agree with the reasoning of ShawJ in Can-Dive Services Ltd v Pacific Coast Energy Corp (1995), 21CLR(2d) 39 (BCSC), where he said at 69-70 that: While I agree with what Madam Justice Mclachlin said so far as it goes, I do not believe she intended to imply that there must be a conscious taking advantage by one party of the other in all cases. The second issue was raised by me and touched upon contentions made by both parties in their written submissions. Further, the character of the mistake was such that any reasonable person similarly circumstanced as each of the plaintiffs would have had every reason to believe that a manifest error had occurred. In doing so, they appear to have also conflated equitable and common law concepts. The following excerpt is particularly significant and compelling: 23 The subsequent exchange further clarifies that the first plaintiff was fully conscious of the potential profit element arising from the purchase of a substantial number of the laser printers. A particular class of case which illustrates unilateral mistake as to the terms intended, known to the other party, is that in which an offer which would be very advantageous to the offeree is snapped up by the offeree.
Case Update: B2C2 Ltd v Quoine Pte Ltd [2019] SGHC(I) 3; Quoine v B2C2 Chwee Kin Keong v Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd [2004] 2 SLR 594; [2004] SGHC 71. The purpose of the amendments was merely to regularise the pleadings and indeed they went no further than to summarise evidence and submissions that had already been raised. This assertion is patently untrue.
Digilandmall - 502 SINGAPORE LAW REPORTS (REISSUE) [2005] 1 SLR(R To export a reference to this article please select a referencing stye below: This selection of essays, case summaries and dissertations is of relevance to law students within the Commonwealth and for those students who are studying the Rule of Law from outside the Commonwealth . High Court and Court of Appeal, recently, in a number of case . The point is, there is a chasm between a clarification amendment and a new or distinct issue being raised at a later stage. When pressed as to whether he visited other websites, he said he could not confirm that one way or the other. I hope by the time you see this email, the price is still at S$66.00 coz they might change it anytime.
Court Determines if There's a Contract Existence - LawTeacher.net His own counsels description of him as careful and prudent only serves to corroborate this. In the absence of proper and full arguments on the issue of which rule is to be preferred, I do not think it is appropriate for me to give any definitive views in these proceedings on this very important issue. His credibility on the material points was dubious, at best. Interestingly, Desmond also remarked to the first plaintiff that he wasnt greedy before I tok to u. The common law has drawn the line in Bell v Lever Bros Ltd. Indeed this appears to be the underlying rationale for the unique legal characteristics attributed to an invitation to treat; see Grainger & Son v Gough [1896] AC 325 at 333334, Esso Petroleum Ltd v Commissioners of Customs & Excise [1976] 1All ER 117 at 126.
Hwa Lai Heng Ricky v DBS Bank Ltd and another appeal and another COOKE v OXLEY (1790) 3 T. R. 653. The recipients of this e-mail included the second, fourth, fifth plaintiffs and Tan Cheng Peng, the third plaintiffs girlfriend. The effect of Solle v Butcher [1950] 1 KB 671 is not to supplement or mitigate the common law: it is to say that Bell v Lever Bros Ltd was wrongly decided. This may be too high a price to pay in this area of the law. It was held that the contract between the parties was void. On the issue of his actual knowledge and communications with the other plaintiffs at the material time, I found his evidence unsatisfactory.
Unilateral Mistake in Contract: Five Degrees of Fusion of - Jstor The essence of snapping up lies in taking advantage of a known or perceived error in circumstances which ineluctably suggest knowledge of the error. No cash had been collected. 154 Interestingly, of the 784 persons who placed 1,008 orders for 4,086 laser printers, only these six plaintiffs have attempted to enforce their purported contractual rights. 81 Plaintiffs counsel thereafter responded somewhat curiously. Established common law principles, in the arena of mistake, ought not be trifled with unless they are so obviously anachronistic and ill-suited to commercial and legal pragmatism. 155 The Internet has revolutionised commerce and radically altered the manner in which commercial interaction currently takes place. This view seems to suggest that principles of equity invariably provide an equally strong but more elastic second string to the bow. It is plain that the defendant had given careful consideration to this issue and was prepared to contract on the basis that it would be able to comply with any orders hence, there was no reference to any order being subject to stock availability. 122 For now it appears that a mistaken party can have two bites at the cherry. This is without basis. In the recent case of Chwee Kin Keong and others v Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd (2005), the Singapore Courts were provided with an opportunity to revisit the law concerning mistakes made in the formation of a contract, in particular, in the context of online contracts. Date of Verdicts: 12 April 2004, 13 January 2005. 53 He claimed that seeing the same price on the Digilandmall website confirmed his view that there had been no mistake. 152 This view has also found support in the Singapore context. [emphasis added]. 70 The third plaintiff proceeded to place orders on behalf of the sixth plaintiff on the HP website. That said, it also offers new avenues of evidential proof offering intimate insights into realtime thought processes and reactions.
Offer and acceptance - The analysis is structured around the There cannot be any legitimate expectation of enforcement on the part of the non-mistaken party seeking to take advantage of appearances. This price was much lower than the actual retail price, and had been posted on the defendant's website by mistake. Altogether, the second plaintiff purchased 180 units, opting for cash on delivery as the payment mode. Scorpio: 13/01/20 01:43 yeah man whats the original price? They then argue that as equitable defences have not been pleaded, the court has no alternative but to allow the claim. It was only then that the defendant promptly took steps to remove all references to the laser printer from all three websites. He appeared distinctly uncomfortable during several phases of his cross-examination and his answers on crucial points were evasive and often vague.. His evidence in relation to the level and nature of communications he had with the second and third plaintiffs on the morning in question lacked candour. I find it inconceivable, to say the least, that the fifth plaintiff would have placed an order for 100 laser printers without the conviction that it was in fact a current market model with a real and substantial resale value. I found his entire evidence relating to his communication with the first and other plaintiffs unsatisfactory and in many aspects incredulous. Court name Singapore High Court. What is urged is that, owing to a common error as to some fundamental fact, the agreement is robbed of all efficacy. The fourth plaintiff duly accessed the e-mail the second plaintiff had sent him pursuant to their conversation. In such cases, it would be unconscionable to enforce the bargain and equity will set aside the contract. Daniel was previously a partner and head of the technology practice at Messrs Rajah & Tann. He is currently a supervisor in the taxation department of an international accounting firm, Deloitte & Touche, specialising in corporate taxation services. Cases of fraud and misrepresentation, and undue influence, are all catered for under other existing and uncontentious equitable rules. Arrival can also be immaterial unless a recipient accesses the e-mail, but in this respect e-mail does not really differ from mail that has to be opened.
PDF E-commerce Contract For Sale Of Printers Held Void For Obvious Mistake So there is a contract and therefore the defendant is liable in breach of contract. 43 After receiving a call from the first plaintiff at about 2.00am informing him that he had found an opportunity to make money as there was an arbitrage position to be achieved for some Hewlett Packard printers, the third plaintiff duly accessed his e-mail and visited the HP website. Phang, Controversy in Common Mistake [2003] Conv 247; Reynolds, Reconsider the Contract Textbooks (2003) 119LQR 177.
How do I Locate Case Law?: Case Names & Citations A contract will not be concluded unless the parties are agreed as to its material terms. It is not in dispute that the defendant made a genuine error. Though the six plaintiffs accounted for only 18 of these purchase orders, they figure prominently among the 11 individuals who ordered more than 50 laser printers. I have found that the plaintiffs had at all material times knowledge of or, at the very least, a real belief that an error had been made by the defendant in the price posting. I agree that this exception should be kept within a very narrow compass. This judgment text has undergone conversion so that it is mobile and web-friendly. He graduated with an accounting degree from NTU.
Chwee Kin Keong and others v. Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd. [2004 - vLex As part of its business, it operates a website owned by Hewlett Packard (HP) at, 16 When the first plaintiff eventually succeeded in accessing the HP website, he immediately placed an order for 100 laser printers at about, 17 Having called the second and third plaintiffs at about. In Chwee Kin Keong v. Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd, one of the defendant's employees mistakenly uploaded the contents of a training template onto the defendant's website, resulting in the retail price of S$3,854 for a commercial laser printer on the website being replaced with the figure S$66. This final mass e-mail only reinforces my view that the first plaintiff consistently and continuously entertained the view that the price posting on the HP website was a mistake. One is hard put to imagine that anyone would purchase such an item, let alone place very substantial orders, without making some very basic enquiries as to pricing. 16 When the first plaintiff eventually succeeded in accessing the HP website, he immediately placed an order for 100 laser printers at about 2.05am, charging the transaction to his credit card. In common mistake, both parties make the same mistake.
Chwee Kin Keong v Digilandmall.com Pte Ltd | India Contract Law This contention is wholly untenable. The rigour in limiting this scope is also critical to protect innocent third party rights that may have been acquired directly or indirectly. The law of agency and that pertaining to the formation of contracts are expressly recognised in s13(8) of the ETA as continuing to apply to electronic transactions.