THE ROMAN RIDGE SCHOOL VS STANDARD CHARTERD BANK
2015
HIGH COURT
GHANA
CORAM
- JUSTICE DOREEN G. BOAKYE- AGYEI
Areas of Law
- Contract Law
- Banking and Finance Law
- Evidence Law
2015
HIGH COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The Plaintiff, an international school, sued the Defendant for unlawfully freezing its accounts, leading to severe operational disruptions. The Defendant claimed it was conducting Customer Due Diligence as per anti-money laundering guidelines, but the court found this action unjustified without a lawful court order. The court ruled in favor of the Plaintiff, holding that the Defendant breached the contract and awarding damages to the Plaintiff.
The Plaintiff sued the Defendant claiming the reliefs endorsed on the Writ of Summons as follows: 1. An order directed at the Defendant to remove the unlawful restrictions placed on the Plaintiff account.
2. An amount of GH¢20, 000, 000. 00 (Twenty Million Ghana Cedis) as damages for breach of contract.
3. Costs.
4. Any other reliefs the court may deem fit in the circumstance.
The background of the case is that Plaintiff, a limited liability Company operating the business of an international School, having duly obtained the required permits and license from the Ghana Education Service, sometime in2002 opened four separate accounts at the Opeibea Branch of the DefendantBank.
Plaintiff operated these accounts for the main purposes of receivingschool fees the main source of income of the school and also for meeting itsfinancial obligation to its teaching and nonteaching staff as well as their othersuppliers.
According to Plaintiff, on or about the 30th day of December, 2013, it noticedsome anomalies in the operation of its accounts with Defendant Bank as thecheques it had drawn on the accounts were dishonoured by Defendant Bankin spite of there being enough funds in the accounts to satisfy those cheques.
Plaintiff also received numerous complaints from the parents of students who were not able to pay the school fees of their wards into Plaintiff’s accounts with Defendant Bank.
Being alarmed at these occurrences, officials of Plaintiff paid a visit to theOpeibea Branch of Defendant Bank where upon they were informed thatrestrictions had been placed on their accounts and that it was not possible forany deposits or withdrawals to be made to or from Plaintiff’s accounts.
Thiscaused a surprise to the officials of Plaintiff who had visited the Bank and theydemanded an explanation from the officials of Defendant Bank but theyseemed to have no clue as to why the said restrictions had been placed on theaccounts.
Plaintiff was initially assured that the restrictions would beremoved but a cheque issued to Plaintiff Solicitor and presented at BannesRoad Branch of the Defendant was initially honoured by the bank and wasimmediately recalled, the funds which had been paid withdrawn and thecheque dishonoured with the explanation that the account had been frozen.
Plaintiff’s Solicitor protested to Plaintiff by a letter and the Plaintiffimmediately brought this to the attention of the Defendant by a letter butDefendant was adamant on removing the restriction.
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