I had thought that I would developthoughts on the class action to kick off a new thread. Well I wrote myself a report detailing what I thought the main issues would be, but I ended up with a report that was too long for an HC post (2,500 words), and as I had to guess what the path the claim would take, the report may have missed the nub of the claim.
In summary, the main points of my report are:
Claimants will hold that the contracts were not Consumer Leases, but rather they are Consumer Credit Contracts.
Consequently, interest-rate caps may have been breached, thus giving rise to a claim for damages.
My view is that to change the standard-form contract's overt language styling the contract as a lease, the court would have to strike out some provisions, and construe provisions covering points on which the standard-form contract is silent – something courts are loath to do.
The relevant “representation” (marketing material) can be encapsulated in two words, “rent” and “buy” in that order, and Radio Rentals must honour that representation.
Legislation requires that honouring the representation to rent goods requires that there be no option to purchase the goods, so honouring the buy-side representation must be effected on expiry of the term of the lease, which is what Radio Rentals does.
Radio Rentals presents itself as a rental company, and has done this since 1937; it is known as a rental company; its promotional material clearly promotes rentals; and its standard-form contract screams out that it is a rental contract. It is difficult to imagine that customers were mislead on the nature of the transactions.
However, without knowing what tack the claimants' legal team is going to take, the foregoing points may have missed the thrust of the claim. Consequently, there is not much point developing an argument on a very sandy foundation.
TGA Price at posting:
72.0¢ Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
