Offer and Acceptance Contract 1 Assignment PDF

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Robert v Colin Offer An offer is when two or more parties agree to assent to the terms of an offer by doing or not doing conditions binding to them. For an offer to be valid, it must be communicated to the offeree, be met with consideration with the intention to be legally bound and accepted by the offeree which is to be communicated back to the offeror. Colin is a representative of All Brisbane Removalist (ABR) and Robert is a representative from Gold Coast Storage Company (GCSC). The two have been in contact with one another regarding quotes for moving large quantities of equipment. Robert emailed Colin asking for quotes for moving equipment over a weekend and Colin responded with an offer of $20,000 and if GCSC wished to accept, Robert would have to print out, sign and email a copy of the job confirmation to a designated email address provided by ABR. This occurred on the 13th of July 2020. On the same day GCSC, further enquires about a job over the period of a week and on the 14th of July 2020, ABR responds with a second quote of $15,000 for the job to be done over a weekday period. In both emails ABR has stated the terms for acceptance for each quotation and a designated email address.

Issue: Is this a valid offer. It can be established that both Robert and Colin intended to being in a contractual relationship as Robert was the first one to reach out with a mere inquiry. Colin then responds with an offer to the inquiry and it is repeated once more with another request. In both circumstances Colin has made an offer to Robert as well as expressing the terms of acceptance for each quote. Whilst there is no obvious communication of an offer, there is an indication to an acceptance of an offer such as the attached job form and the request from Colin that if the quotes were to be accepted then the following steps must be completed for the job to be confirmed. Robert contacted Colin requesting quotes for a removal job to be done either over the weekend or weekday. It can be assumed that both parties had the intention of being in a contractual relationship. What started out as a mere inquiry then turned into an offer, where Colin assumes the role of offeror, because he is the one to provide the cost of equipment removal and he is also the one to implement the request once the offer has been accepted by Robert who is the offeree. Rules: Communicated intended to be bound and consideration and accepted It is a valid offer because there is consideration on both sides, Robert wants his equipment transported to another location and is willing to pay Colin to transport it. Colin is willing to accept payment to transport the equipment. Authority: Clarke and Dunraven/ Hermens and Acacia Acceptance by email – when is the contract formed if acceptance by email – Olivaylle v Flottweg

Exception to the rule – email Whether contract completed upon posting or actual receipt of counterpart Instantaneous communication - Nunin Holdings Pty Ltd v Tullamarine Estates Pty Ltd [1994], Hedigan J held that for the 'postal rule' to have effect, it must be reasonably inferred that the offeror contemplated and intended for acceptance to come about through the act of posting • If postal rule applies it will determine the time of the contract and the place of formation of the contract even if the acceptance was never received Withdrawal Conclusion Colin has explicitly indicated the terms of acceptance for each quoted job request. Whilst acceptance occurred before Colin could withdraw the offer to Robert and therefore a binding contract. Colin stating his term of acceptance means that the legislation needs to be upheld for this agreement to be formed. Meaning that despite common law stating that the offeree needs to communicate acceptance of the offer to the offeror, and the general rule of instantaneous communication of when it is capable to being retrieved such as in the case of Olivaylle. In this case, there are more steps involved when a valid acceptance has occurred via email, and that is...

What is an offer Offer is the exchange of promises between two or more parties, it must be met with consideration and intended to be legally bound. Communication is important in both the offer and its acceptance of it. Facts Colin the offeror is a representative for ABR and Robert the offeree is the representative for GCSC. Prior to Colin’s initial offer to Robert, both had been in contact via email regarding quotes for removing large quantities of equipment. On 13th of July 2020, Robert had requested a quote for moving equipment over a weekend and Colin had responded back with a quote of $20,000 and an attached job form, stating the terms for acceptance. On the same day, Robert asked what the difference in price would be for it to be done over a 4day weekday. On 14th of July 2020, Colin, in answer to Robert’s query replied with a second quote of $15,000 for the job to be done over a weekday. He again included an attached job form and the stated terms of acceptance.

On 15th of July 2020, Robert being happy with the $20,000 quote proceeded to accept the offer by printing out, signing and forwarding the job form to ABR’s email at 11:15am. However, the job form was incorrectly sent to the general enquiries email. On the same day, Colin released his mistake and seeks to rectify it by withdrawing the original quotes. He emails Robert at 12:16pm and follows it up with a phone call. Given the facts, it is enough to assume that both Colin and Robert were willingly in agreeance with moving towards a contractual relationship. In both emails sent to Robert, Colin had made offers ready for acceptance. Issue one: Valid Acceptance The general rule for acceptance is it must be communicated to the offeror, either by the offeree or a person authorised to do so. It can be done verbally and/or by conduct. Robert had communicated his acceptance via email, and by all means as stipulated in contract law, it seems to be a valid acceptance. However, the question is, does it assent to the terms as set down by the offeror? The answer is no. In both of Colin’s email giving the quotes for the job, he states, “if you wish to accept this quotation, please print off and sign the attached job form and return the signed form to us by email, to: [email protected]”. It can be inferred by conduct... Robert from his conduct alone showed his acceptance of the offer by prints off, signs and sends the signed job form back to ABR’s email address. The problem is that it is to the wrong email address and not to the one assigned by Colin. It can be argued that by conduct alone, Robert showed his acceptance of Colin’s offer. He printed off the job form, signed it and sent it back to ABR. However, conduct alone is not enough in the, he had to send it to a designated email address. Though robert has shown valid acceptance through conduct alone in this circumstance other obligations were also meant to be met. Similar to empirnall holdings and machon paull partners, conduct alone Communication is not always necessary for acceptance, conduct may be used but it must be combined with other conditions. Therefore, robert was required to send his acceptance to the designated email address. And through conduct it is reasonable then to assume that the offeree knew and accepted the offer according to its terms. Communication of acceptance must be communicated back to the offeror Though the intention of robert was to accept colin’s offer, communication of it had yet to reach colin and to his knowledge robert’s acceptance was still undetermined. Subsequently, colin then decided to revoke the offers and herein lies the big issue. Could Colin still revoke the offer if it had already been accepted? The answer is no. However, Colin as the offeror had the power to

dictate the means of acceptance and in this case, it was for the job confirmation to be sent to the designated email address. Although Robert wished to accept Colin’s offer for the quote of $20,000, he failed to do so in line with the terms that Colin had put forth in the email. In this case, it was sending the signed job form to the designated email address. Even in regard to the electronic transactions act (QLD), 2001, Robert still fails to fulfill the requirements of the legislation in accordance with sections 24 a and b. Although common law requires the timing of the email, legislation further requires that the following take place for valid acceptance via email provides that not only Therein, legislation comes to the fore in particular reference to instantaneous communication, or more specifically emails. Following the decision in Olivaylle’s case for instantaneous communication, the formation of a contract was at the time of receipt, the postal acceptance rule was disregarded as this outweighed the balance of power to the offeror hence time of receipt was acknowledged. In the same way that with email, acceptance is said to have occurred once it arrives in the offeror’s address. But this only applies if the email is sent to the addressee’s designated email address. If however it is sent to another address then two steps must be certain and that is when it becomes capable of bring retrieved and when the addressee becomes aware of it. Failure to meet the legislation imposed upon for contract formation using email by section 24 of the electronic transaction act. In both parts a and b, robert had failed to send the email to the designated email address so being capable to retreive by the addresseee made it null and void. Even if part b I and ii were considered and it was accepted at another email address, the one that the original offer was made from, Colin the addressee had not been made aware of the email, meaning that 11 had not been fullfilled as a requirement of the legislation. In conclusion Robert’s acceptance was invalid as he had erred in the terms of communication for a valid acceptance by not following the directions which was stipulated in the terms of the offer. This is further compounded by the fact that he failed to alert Colin to the email. In turn, it was within Colin’s legal right to revoke the offer because no valid acceptance had been made. Robert cannot enforce the contract because there is no contract between them. Colin had officially revoked the offer which meant that the offer had expired and was no longer available for acceptance....