When ISPs advertise &quot;No Contract&quot;, what do they truly mean? Many ISPs incorrectly advertise that they require &quot;no contract&quot; like CanNet and Coextro below, because undoubtedly customers form a legal contract with the ISP that fulfills these five Necessary Conditions for forming a contract. McKendrick. Contract Law: Text, Cases, and Materials (2020 9 ed). p 17. A party who wishes to establish that a legally binding contract has been formed between himself and another party must prove a number of matters. The first is that the parties have reached agreement. This is usually done by demonstrating that one party has made an offer that the other has accepted. The rules relating to offer and acceptance are discussed in Chapter 3. Secondly, the agreement must be expressed in a form that is sufficiently certain for the court to be able to enforce. The tests applied by the courts when deciding whether a term has been expressed in a form that is too vague, incomplete, or uncertain to be enforced are p 18. discussed in Chapter 4. Thirdly, the agreement must be supported by consideration (although it is possible that effect may be given to a promise that is unsupported by consideration via an estoppel). The doctrine of consideration and the role that estoppel can play in giving effect to promises that are unsupported by consideration are discussed in Chapter 5. Fourthly, the law may only recognize the validity of the agreement if it is entered into in a particular form (such as writing). The significance of requirements of form has diminished in recent years but they have not been entirely abolished. Requirements of form are discussed in Chapter 6. Finally, the parties must have had an intention to create legal relations. This intention is presumed in commercial transactions, but in the case of domestic and social agreements the law initially presumes that the parties did not intend to be legally bound by their agreement. The doctrine of intention to create legal relations is discussed in Chapter 7. Thus how ought these advertisements be rectified? What's more correct to write than &quot;no contract&quot;?
Thus how ought these advertisements be rectified? What's more correct to write than &quot;no contract&quot;? Words don't mean the same thing in every context. In the world of cell phone contracts, the well accepted meaning of &quot;no contract&quot; is that you are getting cell phone service on a month to month basis and may cancel at the end of any given month with no penalty, in contrast to the previous norm in the industry that you needed to continue service for a period of one or more years before you could cancel or you would pay a penalty for discontinuing it early. This usage has spread to Internet service as well. There is no need to correct or rectify this. Nobody believes that there is no agreement governing the cell phone company-customer relationship. They aren't confused or misled. McKendrick is simply using a different sense of the word than CanNet. In the same way, the word &quot;company&quot; can mean a legal entity, but can also mean, the people whom you have with you at a given time, even though they have the same root meaning. Likewise, sometimes &quot;sex&quot; means &quot;male or female&quot; and sometimes it means something you do for enjoyment and procreation. But people manage to keep the two senses of the word, which are related to each other, straight, even in statutes. Context prevents confusion. There is no need for words to have only one meaning in all contexts and even within the law, many words mean different things in different situations. This is especially true in common law systems where words are given definitions in a piecemeal case by case manner, rather than due to a single person or committee making a top down decision on what a word's legal meaning should be in all contexts.
canada1 The judgment you have read about is South West Terminal Ltd. v Achter Land, 2023 SKKB 116. The judge did not hold that &quot;👍&quot; is categorically considered to be binding agreement. The judge applied the modern approach to contractual interpretation outlined by the Supreme Court of Canada in Sattva Capital Corp. v. Creston Moly Corp., 2014 SCC 53 and Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church of Canada St. Mary Cathedral v. Aga, 2021 SCC 22. This requires judges to interpret the text of the contract and indicators of acceptance in light of the surrounding circumstances. Regarding interpretation, see Sattva: a decision-maker must read the contract as a whole, giving the words used their ordinary and grammatical meaning, consistent with the surrounding circumstances known to the parties at the time of formation of the contract. Consideration of the surrounding circumstances recognizes that ascertaining contractual intention can be difficult when looking at words on their own, because words alone do not have an immutable or absolute meaning Regarding formation, see Aga (internal citations removed): [36] For present purposes, it will suffice to focus on the requirement of intention to create legal relations. As G. H. L. Fridman explains, “the test of agreement for legal purposes is whether parties have indicated to the outside world, in the form of the objective reasonable bystander, their intention to contract and the terms of such contract”. This requirement can be understood as an aspect of valid offer and acceptance, in the sense that a valid offer and acceptance must objectively manifest an intention to be legally bound. [37] The test for an intention to create legal relations is objective. The question is not what the parties subjectively had in mind but whether their conduct was such that a reasonable person would conclude that they intended to be bound. In answering this question, courts are not limited to the four corners of the purported agreement, but may consider the surrounding circumstances. See also Owners, Strata Plan LMS 3905 v. Crystal Square Parking Corp., 2020 SCC 29, para. 37: the offer, acceptance, consideration and terms may be inferred from the parties’ conduct and from the surrounding circumstances The conclusion about the 👍 emoji was case-specific. See paras. 62-63: [62] ... Again, based on the facts in this case – the texting of a contract and then the seeking and receipt of approval was consistent with the previous process between SWT and Achter to enter into grain contracts. [63] This court readily acknowledges that a 👍 emoji is a non-traditional means to “sign” a document but nevertheless under these circumstances this was a valid way to convey the two purposes of a “signature” – to identify the signator (Chris using his unique cell phone number) and as I have found above – to convey Achter’s acceptance of the flax contract. 1.&quot;Even if you supply a jurisdiction tag, we expect and encourage answers dealing with other jurisdictions – while it might not answer your question directly, your question will be here for others who may be from those jurisdictions.&quot;
Those two situations should be legally equivalent. The key thing is that you intend to agree to the contract, and are taking physical steps that are intended to manifest your agreement. If you had added an electronic signature to the PDF file, and transmitted this to the company, it should also be legally equivalent, and just as binding as the pen and paper method.
You are not bound by any contract. You bought a physical good that the seller was barred from selling outside of the listed countries by his supplier. You did not enter a contract with the seller's supplier. Let's look the stream of commerce: Supplier of the item (Printing press) offers it. Sale with a sales limiting contract to resellers. Sale by reseller to customer without limiting contract. The first sale doctrine says, that without a form of contract, the rights of the supplier are exhausted in step 2. Even with a contract limiting the reseller's rights, step 3 exhausts any right the supplier has in the item, unless he too explicitly signs a contract. Selling an item in normal commerce is not satisfying this requirement. There already were no rights in the physical copy of the book when whoever bought the book first sold it to the second-hand seller you bought it from, and there can't be any more rights in the selling of this book gained by the original supplier unless he bought the book back from you.
Consideration has to be sufficient; it does not have to be adequate See What is a contract and what is required for them to be valid? Consideration need not be adequate; that is, the deal does not have to be &quot;fair&quot;. Consideration must be sufficient - this is different from adequacy. Insufficient consideration falls under: performance of a duty imposed by law, performance of a duty imposed by an existing contract, acceptance by a creditor of part payment by a third party, composition with creditors, moral obligation (i.e. you can't do it for love), illusionary or uncertain promises. Parties are free to make whatever bargain they choose and it is not for the courts to enquire as to whether it was an objectively &quot;good&quot; bargain for both parties. The court does not care why you made the deal you did or if anyone else would make such a deal (with some very narrow exceptions: see unconscionability) or even if you come to regret the deal you made: they will just enforce it. In fact, contracts where one person promises to pay £1 or some other nominal sum are so common that they have a name: Peppercorn contracts. That's because under common law (civil law is different) &quot;bare&quot; promises cannot be enforced but if I pay you £1 in return for your promise, then we have a contract.
First, the clearly redundant phrase is “applicable laws” - these apply to everything. Second, some acts, particularly consumer protection or sale of goods acts imply provisions into a contract, create obligations that sit beside the contract or create equitable remedies. Many of these can be limited or excluded but this needs to be done explicitly. Third, in legal writing, clarity is preferred to brevity - nice if you can get both but if not, be clear rather than brief. Fourth, the contract is not the document. The document is a record of the “meeting of the minds” that formed the contract. In the event of a dispute, it may be useful to know that particular laws were specifically considered by the parties. Fifth, in legal writing, just as all writing, some people are better than others.
Do they have to use all caps? Well, no. It's just that companies feel that's the easiest way to make the text "conspicuous" which is required by the Uniform Commercial Code explicitly in § 2-316. Exclusion or Modification of Warranties. (2)Subject to subsection (3), to exclude or modify the implied warranty of merchantability or any part of it the language must mention merchantability and in case of a writing must be conspicuous, and to exclude or modify any implied warranty of fitness the exclusion must be by a writing and conspicuous. Language to exclude all implied warranties of fitness is sufficient if it states, for example, that "There are no warranties which extend beyond the description on the face hereof." The term "conspicuous" is defined in § 1-201. General Definitions. "Conspicuous", with reference to a term, means so written, displayed, or presented that a reasonable person against which it is to operate ought to have noticed it. Whether a term is "conspicuous" or not is a decision for the court. Conspicuous terms include the following: (A) a heading in capitals equal to or greater in size than the surrounding text, or in contrasting type, font, or color to the surrounding text of the same or lesser size; and (B) language in the body of a record or display in larger type than the surrounding text, or in contrasting type, font, or color to the surrounding text of the same size, or set off from surrounding text of the same size by symbols or other marks that call attention to the language. So you could make the text all bold and italic. You could make the font color purple. It's just that most companies use the caps lock key, whatever their individual reasons may be. I'll also note that this is a commercial code and these rules are found under Article 2 - Sales. So you'll only see this requirement taking effect in terms/disclaimers for companies which actually let end-users engage in commercial activity (they're actually selling something). Any site which doesn't facilitate commercial activity will likely be using a warranty disclaimer as a note of "hey, this is a free site, so no you don't get a warranty or legal expectation of service of any sort."
As a buyer, you can write anything you want (aside from anything illegal) into a contract, i.e. to withhold the last payment on a item until you check off the final product specs, but that won't make a difference unless the manufacturer agrees to the contract. A contract that is agreed to (written and agreed to (typically signed), or verbal and verbally agreed to) is legally binding; a contract not agreed to is little more than a wishlist. If this involves, as you say, online purchases or when the customer is remote and working through an agent, a contract can still legally binding, but the contract may be more complex. You may need to draft more stipulations into the contract with all involved, (agent and manufacturer); but again, those mean nothing if the contract is not agreed to. See Contracts - Legal Information Institute for an outline of the steps of making a contract: An agreement between private parties creating mutual obligations enforceable by law. The basic elements required for the agreement to be a legally enforceable contract are: mutual assent, expressed by a valid offer and acceptance; adequate consideration; capacity; and legality. The enforcement of breaking a contract is a completely different situation. You may draft arbitration arbitration (Legal Information Institute) into the contract; or may go to civil court.