Examples
I. An example used in United States law schools is usually the case of Steven v Bromley & Son [1919].
- Facts
- Shipowners agreed a charter fee for the transportation of steel billets
- The charterers loaded general merchandise, in breach of the agreement
- Issue
- Could the ship owners be entitled to nominal damages only; or could a contract be inferred at a higher rate
- Claim for beyond nominal damages allowed
- A contract could be inferred such that the shipowners were entitled to the general rate for the ‘breaching’ cargo loaded.
II. Person A (plaintiff in this hypothetical) tells neighbor B (defendant) that he is going to build a wall on their property that will give a benefit to both A and B; A implies that it would be cheaper for both of them if A performs the labor instead of hiring a professional. B agrees that the wall should be built, but no price is negotiated. A builds the wall, and then asks B to compensate him for the benefit of the wall that he conferred on B (usually half the value of the wall). B refuses. A is entitled to some compensation based on quantum meruit. This is because there was an implied promise between A and B, which is derived from contract law, because A was acting under the assumption that B would pay for part of his services (see Estoppel). The winning of the case, or damages that would be agreed in any out of court settlement, will be directed as an assumpsit on a quantum meruit. Day v. Caton, 119 Mass. 513 (1876).
- In Canada, quantum meruit is not based on contract law but rather depends on equitable principles of unjust enrichment. The old maxim: estoppel allows an implied promise to act as a shield against litigation but never a sword is in general upheld in Canadian law. Therefore an implied promise would not create a cause of action. Instead quantum meruit is based on the need to prevent the neighbor from unjustly enriching himself by allowing the fence builder to proceed with the work based on an assumption that he would be compensated.
III.Quantum meruit can also apply where there is a breached contract.
- A contractor is contracted to work on a school. He does some work but then quits (breach of contract). He is entitled to be paid for the services he has already provided for the school on the basis of quantum meruit (however the school may be entitled to damages if it can prove the balance of the works will at market rates cost more than the balance if performed by the earlier contractor; and in some jurisdictions inconvenience/loss of amenity damages especially where time is stated to be of the essence).
IV. If a contractor finds part of their work replaced by others through no fault of their own, they seek damages for the amount(s) that the defendant benefited. Third parties, absent provisions preventing, such as new contractors finding the work more complex as a result of defects may, just as with all equitable actions, like a quantum meruit-basis restitution, promptly to avoid the doctrine of laches (equity) (having let matters lie) bring action against that contractor.
V. A promoter enters into a long-term service contract with a theatre to help book and organise shows for no one else for a few months. They take part-paid bookings for shows over these months but pass on none of that as agreed as they have grounds to allege the theatre is unsafe and the theatre need to make it safe. The theatre performs no repairs. Instead, the theatre terminates the contract before the benefit of the shows. After this the theatre runs most of the shows and gains benefit but does not pay the promoter. Some shows the theatre cancels without cause. A court would decide, following similar precedent, that the promoter is entitled to an assumpsit on a quantum meruit if the promoter has acted in a proportionate way as trustee (depository), delaying forwarding of the principal of the ticket sale part-payments, for sufficiently well-founded premises defects which could have affected its reputation.
A quasi-contract is a fictional contract recognised by a court. The notion of a quasi-contract can be traced to Roman law and is still a concept used in some modern legal systems. Quasi contract laws have been deduced from the Latin statement "Nemo debet locupletari ex aliena iactura", which proclaims that no one should grow rich out of another person's loss. It was one of the central doctrines of Roman law.
The forms of action were the different procedures by which a legal claim could be made during much of the history of the English common law. Depending on the court, a plaintiff would purchase a writ in Chancery which would set in motion a series of events eventually leading to a trial in one of the medieval common law courts. Each writ entailed a different set of procedures and remedies which together amounted to the "form of action".
Restitution and unjust enrichment is the field of law relating to gains-based recovery. In contrast with damages, restitution is a claim or remedy requiring a defendant to give up benefits wrongfully obtained. Liability for restitution is primarily governed by the "principle of unjust enrichment": A person who has been unjustly enriched at the expense of another is required to make restitution.
Assumpsit, or more fully, action in assumpsit, was a form of action at common law used to enforce what are now called obligations arising in tort and contract; and in some common law jurisdictions, unjust enrichment. The origins of the action can be traced to the 14th century, when litigants seeking justice in the royal courts turned from the writs of covenant and debt to the trespass on the case.
In trust law, a constructive trust is an equitable remedy imposed by a court to benefit a party that has been wrongfully deprived of its rights due to either a person obtaining or holding a legal property right which they should not possess due to unjust enrichment or interference, or due to a breach of fiduciary duty, which is intercausative with unjust enrichment and/or property interference. It is a type of implied trust.
Damages for breach of contract is a common law remedy, available as of right. It is designed to compensate the victim for their actual loss as a result of the wrongdoer’s breach rather than to punish the wrongdoer. If no loss has been occasioned by the plaintiff, only nominal damages will be awarded.
Fibrosa Spolka Akcyjna v Fairbairn Lawson Combe Barbour Ltd[1942] UKHL 4 is a leading House of Lords decision on the doctrine of frustration in English contract law.
The English law of unjust enrichment is part of the English law of obligations, along with the law of contract, tort, and trusts. The law of unjust enrichment deals with circumstances in which one person is required to make restitution of a benefit acquired at the expense of another in circumstances which are unjust.
Contract law regulates the obligations established by agreement, whether express or implied, between private parties in the United States. The law of contracts varies from state to state; there is nationwide federal contract law in certain areas, such as contracts entered into pursuant to Federal Reclamation Law.
Baltic Shipping Company v Dillon, the Mikhail Lermontov case, is a leading Australian contract law case, on the incorporation of exclusion clauses and damages for breach of contract or restitution for unjust enrichment.
Sumpter v Hedges [1898] 1 QB 673 is an English contract law case concerning substantial performance of a contract and restitution for unjust enrichment.
Cutter v Powell (1795) 101 ER 573 is an English contract law case, concerning substantial performance of a contract.
BP Exploration Co (Libya) v Hunt [1983] 2 AC 352 is an English contract and unjust enrichment case, concerning the frustration of an agreement.
An action for money had and received to the plaintiff's use is the name for a common law claim derived from the form of action known as indebitatus assumpsit. The action enabled one person to recover money which has been received by another: for example, where a plaintiff paid money to the defendant while labouring under a mistake of fact or where there was a total failure of consideration. The action was a personal action only available in respect of money, rather than other benefits. Where the benefit received by the defendant was services or goods, the appropriate action was a quantum meruit or a quantum valebant, respectively.
Pavey & Matthews Pty Ltd v Paul, is a leading Australian case concerning unjust enrichment, and an award for restitution based on quantum meruit.
Exall v Partridge (1799) 101 ER 1405 is an English unjust enrichment law case, concerning enrichment through discharge of a debt, and the unjust factor of legal compulsion to give another a benefit.
Benedetti v Sawiris[2013] UKSC 50 is an English unjust enrichment law case, concerning the method for determining the amount of a quantum meruit claim. It was decided by the United Kingdom Supreme Court.
Ajaxo Inc. v. E*Trade Financial Corp., 187 Cal.App.4th 1295 (2010), is the second appeal on a dispute dated back to 1999. During the original 2000 case, defendant E*Trade, an online financial services company, was found liable for maliciously and willfully misappropriating trade secrets pertaining to wireless stock trading technology acquired from the plaintiff, Ajaxo. Under the Uniform Trade Secrets Act E*Trade was required under a mutually signed Non-disclosure agreement (NDA) to keep Ajaxo's trade secrets confidential. After a jury trial in 2003, E*Trade was fined $1.3 million to be paid to Ajaxo for the misappropriation and breach of NDA. The court denied Ajaxo's request for additional damages. All parties appealed. In 2005 the California courts of appeal affirmed the original ruling but remanded the case back to the trial court to determine additional damages. A jury verdict in 2008 rejected claims raised and demands for royalty damages from Ajaxo. In trade secret cases it is common for a plaintiff to seek royalty damages when they are unable to show an actual loss or that the defendant received some inequitable benefit from the misappropriation. In this case the court refused to allow evidence of royalty damages, claiming there were no net damages. Ajaxo appealed. In 2010 the California courts of appeal once again remanded the case back to the trial court reasoning that in such cases an exact quantitative measure of wrongful enrichment damages incurred by the plaintiff might not be sufficient to reject the claim of reasonable royalties based damages
Quantum valebant is a Latin phrase meaning "as much as they were worth". It is sometimes used in its singular form, quantum valebat, meaning “as much as it was worth". It is a common count at law very similar to quantum meruit. The two legal actions differ only in that quantum meruit is used to recover the reasonable value of services rendered, while quantum valebant is used to recover the reasonable value of goods sold and delivered. This count is considered a type of assumpsit.
Moses v Macferlan (1760) 2 Bur 1005 is a foundational case in the law of restitution holding that in certain circumstances such as when money is paid by mistake, for failed consideration or under oppression; the law will allow the money to be recovered.
