Our Commercial Litigation team have had recent success defending claims of allegations of fraud and mis-selling
In acting on behalf of a UK company in the leisure sector, allegations of fraud and mis-selling were made against our client and successfully defended.
In order to combat the allegations of fraud and mis-selling, an application was made to the Court for Judgment in favour of our client for monies due and to strike out the Defence and Counterclaim as it was our opinion that the Defendants’ claims were bound to fail as they had no merit.
The application was made in accordance with Civil Procedure Rules 24.2 and 3.4 and in consideration of the case the Court would need to have the principles of the application to mind as set out by Judge Lewison in Easyair Ltd v Opal Telecom Ltd (2009) these being (a) the Court must consider whether the claimant has a “realistic” as opposed to a “fanciful” prospect of success, (b) a “realistic” claim is one which carries some degree of conviction, this means a claim that is more than merely arguable, (c) in reaching its conclusion the Court must not conduct a “mini-trial”.
In the first of the two cases the Defendants had already made complaints to the Financial Ombudsman Service some two – three years earlier but their complaint had failed on the grounds that all details were transparent, documentation had been provided and had been clearly visible to the Defendants at the time of signing of both the first and the second Hire Purchase Agreements. Although the Defendants were not bound by the decision from the Financial Ombudsman, this went some way to securing success in our application and was relied upon at the time of the Application hearing before the Court as being reasoned and thoroughly investigated.
At the Application Hearing, the District Judge found that the Defendants had all evidence and details before them at the time of signing the relevant Agreement and it was found that the Claimant had in no way fraudulently caused the Defendants to sign or had given any indication of mis-selling. All facts and details were made available to the Defendants and it was for them to raise any queries or concerns that they may have had prior to signing.
The Defendants version of events were contradicted by contemporaneous documents provided by the Claimant which were available to the Defendants at the time of signing the Hire Purchase Agreements.
Ultimately the Claimant gained success in both cases with costs awarded in our clients’ favour.
Our team are on hand to help with any litigation claims that you may face, please visit our page to find out more and to contact us.
*This article is provided for general information purposes only and does not constitute legal or any other professional advice.