Legal Issues for Top Sound Music Club and Sweet Loud Spice Restaurant

Consumer Rights at Top Sound Music Club

Question 1:  Top Sound is a music social club in Auckland. The members of the club meet twice every week to enjoy music performed by members of the club. Recently, members of the club have decided to increase and diversify their collection of musical instruments. They assigned the task of acquiring these musical instruments to three appointed members. The appointed members decided to make the purchases at the shop of Inter Continental Entertainment (InterContinental). At the entrance of InterContinental’s shop is a sign boldly written “All Purchases are Final. We Do Not Accept Returned Items. Therefore, No Refunds. Please Select Carefully Before Presenting Items for Payment.” The appointed members of the club bought several musical instruments. However, they feel dissatisfied about three items—a Djembe drum, a saxophone, and a guitar. InterContinental’s packaging of the Djembe drum had described the drum as African. However, members of the TopSound club came to discover that the drum had been made in Waikato. Another problem is that the best common type of wood for making Djembe drums is sourced from African mahogany trees, but the drum sold to the club was made from pine wood obtained in New Zealand. The club had paid $500 for the drum. As regards the saxophone, the shop attendant at InterContinental had advised the purchasing members of Top Sound club that, based on feedback from previous buyers, the brand of saxophone they have available for sale at their shop were likely to have some functioning problems. This is because they sound keys were poorly made. The club had paid $600 for the saxophone. Concerning the guitar, when it was bought by members of the club, they realised it had two weak strings. But they did not return it. Members of the club kept using it for four weeks despite being aware of the weakness of the strings. The guitar’s defect got worse. The club had paid $400 for the guitar. With reference to relevant sections of the Fair Trading Act 1986 and the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993, advise the club on the following issues: 1) Whether the club qualifies as a consumer 2) Whether the club can return the drum and what legal remedy they may be entitled to  3) Whether the club can have the saxophone replaced by InterContinental 4) Whether the club can request a return of and refund for the guitar.  Question 2:  On the 3rd of May 2021, Mark Klum went to buy building materials at the LongHi Builders Warehouse Ltd. He had slipped and fallen on his back, possibly breaking a vertebra. He was taken to the hospital for treatment after he collapsed. He had gone to the LongHi warehouse to buy pipes he needed for the performance a plumbing contract scheduled for 2pm that day. Mark had fallen and been injured because the shopping floor was very slippery. Alphonse and Churchill are the employees of the LongHi warehouse who see to the cleaning of the warehouse. Alphonse had applied an excess quantity of detergent to the cleaning bucket, which made the floor slippery. Churchill had joined him in the cleaning process in correcting the slippery state of the floor. Mark Klum has requested LongHi to pay him $3,000 as compensation for the income he lost for not been able to perform the plumbing contract he was due to perform the day he fell and got injured at the warehouse. Advise whether both Alphonse and Churchill caused Mark’s injury. Also advise whether LongHi may be held responsible for Mark’s loss of income. Question 3:  Sweet Loud Spice is a restaurant. It was started in March 2019 by four friends—Jennejohn, Jonathan, Melissa and Ricko. All four friends had all contributed equally towards the starting capital. However, in August 2020, Thaksin, an expert Thai chef, joined the business. Thaksin was assigned the responsibility of directing the operations of the kitchen. The partners agreed with Thaksin that he is to have a share in the profits earned by the restaurant, in equal proportion with all the members. Contrary to the agreement of the partners, Melissa had ordered fish from Daily Seafood on credit. She was aware that the partners had agreed to exclusively purchase fish from Carl Frozen Food. They had agreed to stop buying from Daily Seafood in 2019. In November 2020, one of the restaurant’s employees had caused a major water pipe to break, flooding the restaurant and in the process causing damage to a customer’s laptop. Advise on the following: 1) Whether Thaksin is a partner and whether he may be held jointly liable with other partners for the indebtedness and liabilities of the restaurant. 2) Whether the partners may be held responsible for Melissa’s credit purchase of fish. 3) Whether the partners may be jointly responsible for the damage to the customer’s laptop. With your understanding of the principles that govern the regimes of partnership and agency, discuss the above facts. You are advised to draw on the provisions of Sections 17, 18, 21, 22, and 27 of the Partnership Act of 2019.