Cases - Panamena Europea Navigacion v Leyland

Record details

Name

Panamena Europea Navigacion v Leyland

Date

[1947]

Citation

AC 428

Keywords

Construction contracts - certification - duties and role of certifier - extent of information required to issue certificate - improper delay by certifier in issuing certificate - refusal to issue certificate until requests for additional information complied with

Summary

A contract stipulated that payment for repairs to vessel should be effected promptly after the issue of a certificate by the owners' surveyor that the work has been satisfactorily carried out. The surveyor considered his function of certification was not confined to passing the actual quality of the work done, but that he was also entitled to consider the manner in which the work had been carried out, and, in particular, whether there had been reasonable economy in time, labour and materials. The surveyor declined to deal with the question of certification until the information asked for by him was forthcoming. This meant that an illegitimate condition precedent to any consideration of the granting of a certificate was insisted on by the surveyor. The Court held that 'it is almost unnecessary to cite authority to establish that such conduct ... absolved the respondents from the necessity of obtaining such a certificate, and that the respondents are entitled to recover the amount claimed in the action.'