A COSTLY MISTAKE

Greymouth Evening Star, 6 October 1910, Page 6

A COSTLY MISTAKE

CARELESSLY CODED CARLES. £4OO WORTH OF WRONG GOODS BOUGHT. RT TEtJEGR *PH —PER PRESS VSSCX./ATION.I CHRISTCHURCH, Oct. 5. In. giving judgment for plaintiffs in Colebrook and Knight (London) v. Skelton, Frostick and Co. (Christchurch) ,Justice Sim said that the case illustrated how necessary it was to be careful in the use of telegraphic codes. Owing to a mistake made by the defendants in decoding a message sent by plaintiffs, who were their buying agent in London, and to another mistake made by defendants in coding a message to plaintiffs, the latter had entered into a contract for the purchase of. £4OO of certain parts of an organ, when defendants had intended to instruct them to purchase 400 electrical magnets for £75 for the Christchurch City organ. The question, he said, was whether the loss was to be borne by the plaintiffs or by the defendants. If a principal used ambiguous language in giving instructions to an agent, he ought to suffer for the consequences. If the agent used reasonable intelligence in interpreting his instructions, he Was entitled to be indemnified, although he had made a mistake. In his opinion they were justified in construing the cablegrams as they had done. Judgment was therefore given for the London firm.