In my state a written contract is required for all survey work. If I offer to provide services to a potential client and say I will send a contract, but don't and do not provide services for this client. Will this be considered an oral agreement?
Oral agreements are not worth the paper they are written on.
(Sorry. I HAD to do that!!):-P
I don't know about your state, and I am not a lawyer, but the way I understand it, is that an oral agreement is indeed binding. Where the oral agreement fails, however, is that more often than not the two parties don't agree on what was said, and may not agree to whether it was said at all. The oral agreement is so much harder to proove if push comes to shove. Even if you both agree that an agreement was made, exactly what the terms of your work was may be in contention. ie: I agreed to lay a new floor, but I didn't agree to move all of the furniture first, or install trim.
Of course if some state statute makes any kind of oral agreement or a land survey agreement nonbinding, I sure don't know anything about that.
The main point of the question is "Is the offer to send a contract, an oral agreement to provide services?
There are 6 elements required of any legal contract.
They are:
- Offer
- Acceptance
- Consideration
- Capacity
- Subject Matter
- Legal Form
Do you have a contract? Note that oral contracts can be legally binding although they are problematical as described by someone else above.
In your case it sounds as if you did make an offer.
It also sounds like the client accepted that offer.
Did the client pay you anything? If you got a deposit, then yes. Without the deposit, maybe you have a contract, maybe not.
Do you have the capacity to provide the services agreed upon? As an example you could not be held to a contract to perform brain surgery on someone if you are not a doctor holding the appropriate credentials.
Was the agreement for a lawful service? Contracts to sell illegal drugs are not binding as the actions contemplated in the contract are not legal activities.
Was the agreement in the proper legal form? Certain types of agreements are required to be in writing to be valid. As an example, North Carolina law requires the long term lease of property to be in writing. Want to lease the hunting rights from your neighbors farm? A hand shake deal is unenforceable because it was not in the proper legal form.
Back to the original question. Did you have a binding legal agreement? My guess is what you describe fails the test unless you received some form of compensation in exchange for your offer and their acceptance of your offer to send the written contract.
Larry P
> In my state a written contract is required for all survey work. If I offer to provide services to a potential client and say I will send a contract, but don't and do not provide services for this client. Will this be considered an oral agreement?
a little confused here.
It sounds like you actually had an oral agreement, but only to provide a contract for review and possible acceptance.
Kinda vague... Is there a problem with the potential client wanting you to provide that contract?
Not doing any survey work, so I don't think your board would be concerned... unless the client has some issue with not receiving the written contract.
An 'agreement to agree' is not a true agreement... just a conversation. It may be best to send a letter to the potential client saying you have changed your mind and are not interested in working on their project, nada mas.
PS: google 'agreement to agree'
First there needs to be more than word against word. Someone else would have to been personal witness to both sides of the actual conversation and be willing to testify.
Beyond that, agreements have a bail out clause built in. Both sides of the agreement have the right to change their minds before any solid terms are met.
The most to have lost is that client and his buddies and referrals.
That is my take on oral agreements, I am not a lawyer, so who knows how they can spin it.
In Louisiana, if it is NOT registered in the Clerk's of Court Office in the Parish of proper venue, it does not exist.
I agree it is vague, and probably not proveable. If it is a contract it is one only to send something in writing.
I would be more concerned with my respect and reputation since he knows and you know that you had an agreement.
No. It's an offer to negotiate. Or, you can think of it as an offer to provide initial terms and subject matter.
Had you agreed on everything and the writing was a mere formality in order to satisfy the statute that requires a writing; then you may have a contract that you repudiated (there's a legal term for that situation that I disremember). In your defense, the other party would have to take steps to minimize the damages, as well as contacting you and asking you to perform. If you made an off hand promise that you forgot about, and the other party never persued the issue, and now are trying to get money from you, then they probably are out of luck.
Why did you choose to not provide services to this individual? Could a PIA potential client translate to a PIA talking about oral contracts?
I do know that there are some PIA clients and people that events transpire and it becomes necessary for you to act nice and agreeable just to get them away from where you are.
It is not a crime to lie, maybe not nice, but sometimes necessary when the truth is not what they want to hear.
Then sometimes, after you have some time to think about what has just happened, you decide that what you just said you would do is simply not what you really want.
Being qualified, $$$
Backlogged, $$$$$$$$$$
Exit planning, priceless. 😉