Contract Assignment - Essay Example

With at least two forms –the vendors and the purchasers—vying for legal standing the courts find themselves adjudicating a battle of the forms. They must determine what form applies, if any, or, alternately, that neither form applies and by default, a given contractual dispute must be resolved by recourse to the Sale of Goods Act rather than by the terms and conditions set out by either firm. (“Sale of Goods Act C. 54” 1979) his was the judgement that the court arrived at in “GHSP INC v.

AB ELECTRONIC LTD” [2010] EWHC 1828 (Comm) Case No: 2008 Folio 1353. Neither the form of the seller AB Electronic Ltd. nor that of the purchaser, GHSP Inc. was held to be valid In lieu of a specific contract the court relied on the “Sale of Goods Act, 1979”. This issue is of considerable importance for both buyers and sellers. Understandably, the sellers standard form will contain terms that are beneficial to the seller while the purchasers form will favour the purchasers interests. Often the determination of which contract is applicable will resolve the dispute, implicitly, in favour of the party whose contract is accepted by the courts.

It is for this reason that a battle of the forms can have such great importance. For more than thirty years the courts have relied on Butler Machine Tool Company Ltd. v. EX-CELL-O Corporation (England) Limited” [1977] EWCA Civ 9 Case No. 172 B. No. 234 when confronted with a battle of the forms. Briefly, Butler contracted to produce a production machine for EX-CELL-O Corp. They produced a contract for production of said machine with a price, terms and delivery details. EX-CELL-O responded with acceptance of the price on their own form that contained different details, particularly as they related to additional costs incurred prior to their receipt of the machine.

Butlers contract contained a clause allowing them to charge any price increases