Cases - Simaan General Contracting Co. v Pilkington Glass Ltd (No. 2)

Record details

Name
Simaan General Contracting Co. v Pilkington Glass Ltd (No. 2)
Date
[1988]
Citation
QB 758
Legislation
Keywords
Contract administration
Summary

The plaintiffs were the main contractors for a building in Abu Dhabi. The main contract specified the incorporation of curtain walling double-glazed units of green glass that were manufactured by the defendants. The plaintiffs subcontracted the erection of the curtain walling to a third party company. When the units had been installed, the architect rejected the units as being defective by reason of discrepancies in colouring. The plaintiffs brought an action in negligence against the defendants, alleging that by reason of the defects in the glass units they had suffered economic loss in that payment they would otherwise have received from the employer had been withheld.

The Court of Appeal found that the defendants did not owe the plaintiff a duty of care to avoid defects in the units which had caused them economic loss. Such a claim could only have succeeded if the plaintiff could show a special relationship between himself and the defendant which amounted to reliance by the plaintiff on the defendant (of the kind recognised Hedley Byrne v Heller [1964]). The plaintiffs had required the third party curtain wall erectors to buy the glass from the defendants but only because they had a contractual obligation to do so. The defendants had not assumed a direct responsibility to the plaintiffs for the quality of the glass, accordingly there was no reason to depart from the normal contractual chain of liability.