Every issues within the scenario questions must be backed up with a JTC clause, a case study and what the court ruled within the case study. For clauses MUST use Standard Building Contract with Quantities 2011 Only. For case study use 200 contractual problems and their solutions and David Chappell All the book are in the additional materials
Scenario questions
Question 1
Moss Builders and the Holt Hotels are negotiating a contract for the refurbishment and extension of a hotel complex near Heathrow airport. Negotiations drag on because the parties cannot agree the amount fixed for Liquidated Damages and the procedure for Adjudication.
Holt Hotels finally send a letter of intent instructing Moss Builders to start work, pending agreement on a contract. The parties continue to exchange correspondence and have several meetings without reaching agreement.
Over a 12-month period Moss Builders carries out work and Holt Hotels makes monthly payments in return.
The work is now complete, but Holt Hotels complain that some of the work is defective. Moss Builders refuses to accept any responsibility saying that the parties have no contract.
i) Advise Moss Builders of their legal position.
ii) Would it make any difference if there was defective work, but no payments at all had been made?
Question 2
Free Ltd (F) contractors have a standard form building contract with developers, Masons Ltd (M) to build the roof of a new house of Parliament in Manchester. With permission, F sub-contracted the supply and installation of twenty bathrooms to Vandells Ltd (V). The sub-contract required V to obtain a particularly durable stone tile called Mighty 49. V went and selected the tiles from the cheapest supplier it could find, but soon after the tiles had been installed in all the bathrooms, some of the tiles started to crumble and the tiling needed to be done again. The problem was traced to the manufacture of a batch of tiles that contained hidden defects. F wants the sub-contractor V to pay for the costs of re-tiling. V argues that it does not have to pay these costs because it was not responsible for choosing the type of tiles to be used for the roof, and so it is not its fault if the tiles are of unsatisfactory quality, and are not fit for their purpose.
a) Advise V which argument is likely to be successful in court.
b) What would V legal position be, if instead, it had been contracted to accept a delivery of materials from a supplier nominated by the employer?
c) What would V’s legal position be, if instead, it had been told to choose one type of material from a list of materials given in the contract Bills and he chose Mighty 49 and it was not fit for purpose?
Question 3
In January 2012, the contractor completed a complex which includes a two-storey building with a flat roof and an 11-storey tower block designed by architects. Two years after completion, the owner granted a lease of the complex to a Tenant (under which the Tenant agreed to carry out all repairs if and when required). In 2016 during routine maintenance work to the flat roof, some of the concrete used was found to be ‘soft’. Later it was discovered that the concrete in the pillars of the 11-storey tower block was soft as well. Tests showed that the concrete mix contained too much aggregate and too little cement.
The Tenant decided that the pillars were not strong enough to carry the design load of the building and as a result they were strengthened. It now wants to recover its costs including amongst other things, the cost of strengthening the pillars and cost of alternative accommodation as it needed to vacate the building while the work was done. Advise it in the following circumstances:
a) The contractor claims it has no liability because the final certificate under JCT 11 contract was issued 2 years ago.
b) The architect claims that their contract was a simple and that the limitation period in contract is over.