CHEMITECH LIMITED & ANTOHER v. STANBIC BANK GHANA LIMITED
March 17, 2022
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
- ADJEI, J.A
- GAISIE,J.A
- NOVISI, J.A
Areas of Law
- Contract Law
- Banking and Finance Law
- Evidence Law
- Civil Procedure
- Tort Law
March 17, 2022
COURT OF APPEAL
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
This Court of Appeal judgment arises from a commercial dispute between the 1st Plaintiff, a Ghanaian limited liability company that imported Comma Oil lubricants on a 60-day credit arrangement, and its banker, the Defendant. The bank failed to ensure payment of £5,017 to Comma Oil via HSBC, admitting it could not locate the appropriate account for the bank draft and later unilaterally cancelling a SWIFT transfer. The High Court found the bank negligent, non-suited the 2nd Plaintiff (the Executive Director), and awarded general damages to restore the 1st Plaintiff’s credit capacity. On appeal, Justice Dennis Adjei held that exemplary/punitive damages were inappropriate in a contract case and that the £12 deduction was a legitimate correspondent bank charge, applying Evidence Act s.10(2) and de minimis principles. The Court set aside a separate GH¢10,000 negligence award as duplicative but affirmed the rest of the High Court’s judgment and dismissed the appeal.
ADJEI, J.A
The High Court on 28th February, 2017 delivered its judgment by non-suiting the 2nd Plaintiff as not a necessary party to the action, granted part of the reliefs sought by the Plaintiff and dismissed the others.
The 1st Plaintiff, a limited liability company incorporated under the laws of Ghana and its Executive Director brought an action against the Defendant, a well-known banking institution for: inter alia, negligence; general damages emanating from the negligence; payment of compensatory damages for loss of business, loss of anticipated income and profit, loss of customers, and loss of corporate reputation; special damage in the sum of GB£ 12.00 being an amount short-changed by the defendant and the interest thereon ; an order for the payment of damages for fraudulent concealment and; exemplary damages in the sum of 30 million pounds sterling or its Cedi equivalent for the loss of the 60 - day credit arrangement built with Comma Oil for over twenty years business relationship and loss of reputation of Plaintiffs before Comma.
The 2nd Plaintiff at the Court below and the Plaintiff jointly claimed against the Defendant for payment of compensatory damages for causing an embarrassment to both particularly the 2nd Plaintiff.
The brief facts of the case which culminated in this appeal were that the 1st Plaintiff who has a long standing 60 - day credit trading arrangement with Comma Oil for the supply and shipment of Comma lubricants was prematurely abrogated as a result of the negligence of the Defendant who failed to transfer an outstanding amount of GB£ 5,017.00 on lubricants previously supplied to the 1st Plaintiff by Comma Oil to honour its credit relationship with Comma Oil. Comma Oil was to supply lubricant oil on credit in the sum of GB£ 48,818.86 provided by the 1st Plaintiff discharged its indebtedness in the sum of GB£ 5,017.00 to Comma Oil. The Plaintiff instructed the Defendant to debit its trading account with the sum of GB£5,017.00 to offset the Plaintiff’s indebtedness to Comma Oil for the oil worth GB£ 5,017.00to be shipped to the Plaintiff in Ghana.
The Defendant who was to pay the sum of GB£ 5,017.00 to Comma Oil through its bankers HSBC Bank Plc (HSBC), an international bank in the United Kingdom did not take prudent steps to ensure that payment was effected on behalf of the Plaintiff. The Defendant attributed the non- cashing of the cheque by the HSBC bank to the fact that the cheque had been discoursed on three occasions