The defendants, Mr and Mrs Dixon, were franchisees of an ‘And So To Bed’ shop. The franchise was terminated by the claimant, purportedly under a clause of the franchise agreement which entitled the claimant summarily to terminate the agreement for breach unless rectified within 14 days of notification or for failure to pay franchise licence fees, amongst other grounds. The claimant sued for loss of bargain damages consequent upon its termination, alleging that the agreement had been repudiated by the defendants.
Held: That part of the claim succeeded.
(a) one of the three breaches of contract cited in the termination letter was by nature repudiatory and (b) loss of bargain damages were therefore recoverable although termination was expressed to be under the express contractual term. At [35], Mr Donaldson QC stated, obiter, that on the Boston Deep Sea Fishing principle there was no reason why a termination letter should not be treated as an ‘acceptance’ of a repudiatory breach other than any such breach as was inherent in the factual basis on which the contractual power was stated to be exercised.
Judges:
Donaldson QC
Citations:
[2001] FSR 47
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Phones 4U Ltd v EE Ltd ComC 16-Jan-2018
The parties contracted for the marketing of contracts for the marketing of the defendant’s mobile phone contracts. On the claimant entering administration, the defendant exercised a clause in their contract to terminate the contract. The claimant . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Contract
Updated: 18 May 2022; Ref: scu.621647