Liability Of Ports Hotel, Fraudulent Misrepresentation And Investment Loss

Ports Hotel’s Responsibility for injury

Discuss about the Fraudulent Misrepresentation Lawyers.

As per the present case Don can hold Ports Hotel liable for the loss of his passport and gold chain as the hotel is responsible for safety of their customer and their valuable too. Hotel can’t take an excuse that they have written it in every room that “The Management will not be responsible for valuables lost if these are not given to the front desk for safe-keeping.” Writing such statements can’t take away your liability. It is hotel’s duty for the safety of their customer as well as his / her belongings. They must ensure that no customer should face any issue because of their act or negligence. In our case Don’s passport and gold chain were stolen by a burglar in hotel premises only, this shows that hotel didn’t have a good security system.

Hotel can be held liable under the law of strict liability. Strict liability is a legal doctrine that says a person is liable for loss or damages caused by his / her act or any failure.  In the above mentioned case hotel was liable for the safety and security of the guests staying at their hotel, but hotel authority lacked in providing security to the guests. As a result a burglar came inside the hotel and carried out the deed of theft of Mr. Don’s passport and his gold chain. This clearly shows that hotel has failed in performing its duty of providing security to the guests (Essays, 2013).

In Bass Anne Hendricks v Shangri-la Hotel Ltd (2011) it was said by the plaintiff that

Hotel failed to provide effective security to safeguard plaintiff’s personal property from defendant’s staff or other parties.

Ring was removed from plaintiff’s suit without his consent.

No proper action was taken to find out the lost ring even after the complaint.

Court held the hotel liable for the theft of plaintiff’s ring and court ordered the hotel to pay the amount as compensation to the plaintiff for the loss of his ring from the hotel premises.

In current scenario hotel has one possible defense that is of past dealings (Kelly, 2013). It states that Mr. Don was a regular customer of Ports Hotel, whenever he visited Singapore he used to stay at Ports hotel only. So he was already aware about the condition of keeping valuable with the front desk for safety, if kept in room or elsewhere then hotel won’t be held liable for that loss. The theft had taken place from Mr. Don’s room therefore hotel can this defense in their favor and can remove their liability. Their defense can make Mr. Don equally liable for the loss of his passport and his gold chain as it was his fault that he did not kept his valuable with hotel’s front desk (Lilly, Barrett,  2013).

Liability of investment loss

Ports Hotel can’t be held liable for injuries of Mr. Don because they have already applied a masking tape on the glass pane on a window which was damaged and written on it that “Do not Open”. Even after reading the warning Mr. Don opened that window and as a result of that glass of that window broke down and crashed on him causing him small marks on his forehead. This injury could be avoided if Mr. Don took that warning seriously and have not opened that window. If he wanted some fresh air because of suffocation then he could have called any of the hotel staff to help him out.

Hotel is responsible for safety of its guests that’s why they marked the broken part of the window and written down the warning on that. In this case negligence is on the part of Mr. Don that he ignored the warning and opened the window which caused him injury. In this situation hotel can’t be held liable as they did their duty to inform guests about the broken window. In this situation negligence is done on the part of Mr. Don therefore he can’t claim any compensation from the hotel (Essays, 2013)

In Butterfield vs. Forrester (1809) defendant was residing in Durby and there he built a pole on middle of a public thoroughfare, no one has given him the right to do so. It was 8’ O clock in the evening of August month, and plaintiff was riding on that way, it was dark at that time on the road but the pole was visible from approximately 100 yards. As the defendant was riding rashly and violently he smashed his horse on the pole as the result defendant and his horse both of them fell on the ground. In the judgment of the case court said that plaintiff can’t claim damages because he was also negligent on his part. He saw the pole from appropriate distance from where he could stop his horse but because of his negligence the accident took place and loss has occurred.

Similarly hotel took proper steps to avoid accidents but Mr. Don negligently did the act of opening the window and as the resulted he ended up causing hurt to himself. So by reading the above judgment passed by the Honorable Court we can come to a conclusion that here also plaintiff that is Mr. Don cannot claim any damages from the hotel. If the situation was slightly different like if the hotel authorities have not written down any warning about the glass and then if any accident had taken place in that case hotel could be held liable for being negligent on their part, for not providing safety for their guests (Findlaw, 2017)

References

The investment made by Mr. Don was after seeing the accounts of the Toh’s Gems Company. The auditors of the company showed him that they were earning profits from last two years. Relying upon their Mr. Don invested $ 5 million with the company. When after six month the company went into liquidation Mr. Don came to know that it was a fake audited account that was shown to him at the time of investment. The reality was that company was undergoing losses from last 2 years.  For the above instance the auditors will be held liable for the fraud. Auditors of the company made a fraudulent representation of their company by showing up fake accounts which was absolutely wrong (Clarke, 2016).

In With v O'Flanagan (1936) sale of medical practice took place and vedor demanded £2000 a year for that. When the purchaser signed the contract, the amount was brought down to £250 but the vendor did not told this to the purchaser because vendor was suffering through an illness. In this case Lord Wright MR said that if a statement which is true at the time it was made becomes untrue after certain time then it becomes an obligation for the person who knows it to disclose that to the person who is about to complete that transaction. So it was held that it was misrepresentation on the part of vendor in the above case.

In this also auditors knew that they were misrepresenting Mr. Don but they did not disclose the facts to him. They just wanted that Mr. Don shall invest in the company and they could get money. Mr. Don was believing the statements made by the auditor as true and  didn’t researched about the company more (Essays, 2013).

It is the duty of the party who is making an offer to disclose all the true facts about the product which you are selling. Here the company wanted Mr. Don to purchase its share, so we can say that here the company was selling the product to Mr. Don so it’s the duty of the company that it should disclose all the correct and true facts of the company to the person who is purchasing the share so that he can make up his mind that whether the shares are to be purchased or not. But here the scene was totally different and no true facts of the company was disclosed before Mr. Don which resulted in loss of $ 5 million to him.

References

Bass Anne Hendricks v Shangri-la Hotel Ltd 2011 SGHC 232 Butterfield v. Forrester, (1809) 11 East 60

Clarke, P. (2016). Fraudulent Misrepresentation Lawyers. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/fraudulent-misrepresentation.html

Essays, UK. (2013). Contract Liability. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://www.lawteacher.net/free-law-essays/contract-law/contract-liability.php?cref=1

Essays, UK. (2013). Tort Of Negligence. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://www.lawteacher.net/free-law-essays/tort-law/tort-of-negligence.php?cref=1

Findlaw, (2017). Negligence. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://injury.findlaw.com/accident-injury-law/negligence.html

Kelly, T. (2013). When will previous dealing lead to terms being incorporated in agreements. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/knowledge/publications/77406/when-will-previous-dealing-lead-to-terms-being-incorporated-in-agreements-a-case-note-on-la-rosa-v-nudrill-pt

Lilly, R. Barrett, T. (2013). Prior dealings and contractual terms. Retrieved on 10^th January 2017. Retrieved from https://www.jws.com.au/en/acumen/item/308-prior-dealings-and-contractual-terms