ARTICLE 3.6 - (Error in expression or transmission)

Article 3.6 - (Error in expression or transmission)

2. Mistakes on the part of the receiver

613

Article 3.6 - (Error in expression or transmission)

614

An error occurring in the expression or transmission of a declaration is considered to be a mistake of the person from whom the declaration emanated.

615

COMMENT

616

This article equates an error in the expression or transmission of a declaration with an ordinary mistake of the person making the declaration or sending it and thus the rules of Art. 3.5 and of Arts. 3.12 to 3.19 apply also to these kinds of error.

617

1. Relevant mistake

618

If an error in expression or transmission is of sufficient magnitude (especially if it has resulted in the misstatement of figures), the receiver will be, or ought to be, aware of the error. Since nothing in the Principles prevents the receiver/offeree from accepting the erroneously expressed or transmitted offer, it is for the sender/offeror to invoke the error and to avoid the contract provided that the conditions of Art. 3.5 are met, in particular that it was contrary to reasonable commercial standards of fair dealing for the receiver/offeree not to inform the sender/offeror of the error.

619

In some cases the risk of the error may have been assumed by, or may have to be imposed upon, the sender if it uses a method of transmission which it knows or ought to know to be unsafe either in general or in the special circumstances of the case.

620

Illustration

621

A, a potential Italian client, asks B, an English law firm, for legal advice and by way of reply receives a telegram indicating that B's hourly rate is "£ 150", whereas the form handed by B to the English post office had read "£ 250". Since it is well known that numbers in telegrams are often wrongly transmitted, B is considered to have assumed that risk and is not entitled to invoke the error in the transmission, even if the other conditions of Art. 3.5 are met.

622

2. Mistakes on the part of the receiver

623

Transmission ends as soon as the message reaches the receiver. See Art. 1.9.

624

If the message is correctly transmitted, but the receiver misunderstands its content, the case falls outside the scope of the present article.

625

If the message is correctly transmitted to the receiver's machine which, however, due to a technical fault, prints out a mutilated text, the case is again outside the scope of this article. The same is true if, at the receiver's request, a message is given orally to the receiver's messenger who misunderstands it or transmits it wrongly.

626

In the two above-mentioned situations the receiver may however be entitled to invoke its own mistake in accordance with Art. 3.5, if it replies to the sender and bases its reply upon its own misunderstanding of the sender's message and if all the conditions of Art. 3.5 are met.

UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts with Official Commentary [1994]

PREAMBLE

CHAPTER 1 - GENERAL PROVISIONS

CHAPTER 2 - FORMATION