Q.

On Tuesday Aria tells Bu, a workmate that she is: ‘thinking of selling
her car which is worth about £2,000’. On Wednesday morning Bu emails
Aria: ‘Will take the car for £2,000, will pay U when I see U’. Aria replies by
email on Wednesday evening: ‘Don’t be silly, I was not actually offering to
sell the car but, having thought about it, you can have it for £2,500. I
know you will want it so don’t bother writing back unless you are not
interested.’ Bu is so annoyed when he reads the first sentence of Aria’s
email that he immediately deletes it. On Saturday Aria drives round to
Bu’s house to deliver the car and demands payment. Discuss.
Would your answer differ if, after reading all of the email Aria sent on
Wednesday evening, Bu decided he wanted to buy the car for £2,500 and
Aria now refuses to deliver it?

A legally enforceable agreement known as a Contract establishes, clarifies, and

outlines the rights and obligations of the parties involved. This particular case
addresses a variety of subjects, including an invitation to treat and an offer and
acceptance and we have to consult some of the cases also. Using the IRAC rule, the
first paragraph clarifies the initial statement that Aria spoke to Bu and the
subsequent paragraph lists the additional comments made between the aria and
bu.

By using the IRAC rule, the Issue of A's statement is an offer or an invitation to
treat arises in the first statement made between A and B. An Offer is a declaration
of the desire to enter into a legally binding contract on certain terms and serves as
the basis for any agreement. An offer can be revoked, terminated, or negotiated.
The Rule that clarifies the offer is Storer v Manchester City Council (1974) 3
ALL ER 824. An Invitation to treat indicates that one party is open to receiving
an invitation. As there is no immediate desire to be legally committed, it might
alternatively be seen as an invitation to negotiate rather than an offer. The case
that clarifies the invitation to treat is Gibson v Manchester City Council (1979)
1 All ER 972. We can determine that the first statement in the aria does contain an
offer or an invitation to treat by conducting analysis and comparing the Storer and
Gibson examples. It is obvious from the Storer case that the terms are certain and
the court of appeals determined that a legally enforceable contract existed. The
only thing Storer needed to do to commit himself was to sign the document and
mail it back after the council sent him an offer. In the Gibson case the terms are
uncertain and the council stated that “may be prepared to sell” so it’s not an offer.
Lord Diplock stated that “The words 'may be prepared to sell' are fatal...so
is the invitation, not, be it noted, to accept the offer, but 'to make formal
application to buy on the enclosed application form. It is...a letter setting
out the financial terms on which it may be the council would be prepared
to consider a sale and purchase in due course.” The fact that there was no
price agreement in the Gibson case as opposed to Storer's case is a significant
difference between them. Important terminology in the Gibson case still needed to
be established. The first statement's Conclusion is that by contrasting, it is obvious
that the aria made an invitation to treat when he said, "Thought of selling a car,"
and since the price he mentions is the car's market value rather than an offer.

The second statement between A and B raises the Issue of whether Bu is accepting
or offering. The offer is considered to have been accepted when the recipient of it
expresses his consent. As a result, when accepted, the proposition becomes a
promise. According to the definition, Acceptance occurs when the offeree accepts
the proposition without conditions from the giver. An offer like this becomes a
promise if it is accepted. The analysis say that as we know that in legal terms the
invitation to treat is not an offer so it is not accepted. If the terms are clear in the
first statement so it should be an acceptance to an offer. The conclusion is that it
is obvious that Bu made an offer to Aria of 2000 pounds of her car because the
invitation to treat is not considered to be an offer.

Another statement by Aria to Bu raises the Issue: Is this a counteroffer from aria? A
counter offer is an offer made in response to an earlier offer made by the opposite
party during discussions for a binding agreement. Making a counter offer
automatically rejects the initial proposal; if the counter offer is accepted in
accordance with its conditions, a contract is formed otherwise not. This rule is
applied in Hyde v Wrench (1840) 49 ER 132. The analysis made that the counter
offer is made and it terminates the previous offer as it happened in Hyde v wrench
case so some of the words of the judgment made by the LORD LANGDALE MR is
stated as “I think there exists no valid binding contract between the parties
for the purchase of the property. I think that it was not afterwords
competent for him to revive the proposal of the defendant, by tendering
an acceptance of it; and that, there exists no obligation of any sort
between the parties.”

After reading the first clause of the aria statement, he is now so irritated that he
deletes the email, raising the Issue of whether or not the acceptance is legitimate.
Or has Bu actually read it? The Rule or case applied in this situation is Felthouse v
Bindley (1862) EWHC CP J35. The outcome of this case is that it was decided
that the complainant and his nephew had no agreement over the horse. The offer
had not been accepted, silence did not constitute acceptance, and another person
cannot impose an obligation. Any acceptance of an offer must be made known in a
concise manner. There was no contract of sale, notwithstanding the nephew's
intentions to sell the horse to the complainant and his expressed desire. Therefore,
the nephew's silence on the complainant's offer did not constitute an acceptance of
it. After reading the Felthouse case, it is concluded that aria and Bu did not enter
into a contract since acceptance must be clearly conveyed and cannot be imposed
owing to one party's silence. Silence does not constitute acceptance.
I don't think my response would be the same if Bu sees the entire email that Aria
sent on Wednesday and stays silent, because of the condition she imposed in the
mail to remain silent for the acceptance. A contract has been made between the
two parties, and if Aria refuses to provide it, she is in breach of that contract.