£110,000 ERROR BY A TYPIST

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 8681, 14 March 1914, Page 2

£IIO,OOO ERROR BY A TYPIST

GOVERNMENT department AND A CONTRACTOR.

A typist’s mistake which might have cost the Commissioners of Works over £IIO,OOO wag mentioned in a'London court the other dny*

Th© Commissioners had arranged for the building of a post office at a cost of £20,000, but a typist in tire office, in typing the form of contract -with schedules for the contractor, Mr William Frederick King, who trades. as King and Son, accidentally substituted the words “cubic feet” for “cubic, yards.” This multiplied! the agreed coat by 27, and the Commissioners now applied to the court asking that the contract should he rectified. If the . error. was . taken for calculation, the Solicitor-General explained, the £20,000 contract would -work out ■at £133,400. In the course of his evidence Mr King explained that in discussing his •account with a Mr Baylis at the Office of Works he drew Mr Baylis’s attention to the mistake in typing, and said that upon it he could claim. He said at the same time that if the Commissioners of Works treated him reasonably h© had’ no wish to take undue advantage. Mr Justice Sargant said the court had ample jurisdiction to rectify, My King, h© was sorry to say, was opposing the rectification in order that he might enforce this “absurd and preposterous claim” against'the Commissioners of Works and use it as a lever by which to extract from them something more than his legal rights. He was seeking to take advantage of the slip of a typist. Judgment was entered against the defendant, the rectification asked for being granted. - ■ •