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Vaioleti v Cross & The Commodities Board, Supreme Court, Tonga (Case Note) [1998] JSPL 26; (1998) 2 Journal of South Pacific Law

VAIOLETI v CROSS & THE COMMODITIES BOARD

[1990] TLR 108
Supreme Court, Nuku’alofa, Tonga

Facts:

The Board advertised a prize draw for which only its employees who were not late or absent during a specified period were eligible for entry. The plaintiff went to work every day but one during the specified period, and on that day she arranged for a replacement to do her shift for her. Further, in the week of her absence the plaintiff did extra shifts herself, completing 44 to 48 hours all together, whereas one shift each day, as required to qualify for the draw, would only have totalled 40 hours. The draw was cancelled by the Board on the basis that none of its employees had qualified.

Claim:

The plaintiff sued Cross, the former manager of the Board’s factory, and the Board for breach of contract. She claimed specific performance of the agreement to hold the draw or damages for breach of the agreement to do so.

Outcome:

The plaintiff qualified for the draw and judgment was given in her favour. Specific performance being inappropriate, damages were awarded on the basis of the value of the plaintiff ‘s lost chance to win a prize. The plaintiff’s evidence that two other employees had also qualified to participate in the draw being undisputed, damages in respect of the main draw were calculated as the equivalent of either one-third of the value of the first prize, one-half of the value of the second prize, or one-third of the value of the third prize, which ever was the greater. In addition damages in the sum of one-third of the value of the prize in the special draw were payable. Costs were also awarded against the defendants.

Legal Principles:

Ratio Decidendi

The advertisement to hold a prize draw constituted an offer that was accepted by the plaintiff when she began working at the beginning of the specified period.

The express terms of the unilateral contract, contained in the advertisement of the draw, were intended to be supplemented by terms implied from known custom and usage (in this case, the usage of allowing an employee to arrange a stand in to replace them during a shift).

The court may refuse to exercise its discretion to grant the equitable remedy of specific performance if a long period of time had elapsed since the events in question.

Damages are measured by what the guilty party ought to have foreseen as the loss liable or not unlikely to result from the breach.

Contract terms must be interpreted in the light of the purpose that the parties were attempting to achieve, which in this case was the improvement of production.

Obiter Dicta

In addition to implying terms from known usages, a court may imply a term from a previous course of dealing.

It is a serious procedural error to mislead an opponent, whether deliberately or by mistake, by failing to expressly plead a specific fact relied on, such as that the plaintiff was disqualified from entry into the draw by failure to attend work on a particular day.