A New Zealand woman has taken her long-term boyfriend to a disputes tribunal for breaching a “verbal contract” by failing to take her to the airport, resulting in her missing a flight to a concert and forcing her to delay her travel by one day.
The woman told New Zealand’s disputes tribunal that she had been in a relationship with the man for six and a half years until the disagreement arose.
According to an order from the tribunal, released on Thursday with names redacted, the woman had arranged to attend a concert with some friends. Her boyfriend had agreed to transport her to the airport and stay at her house to look after her two dogs while she was away.
She messaged him the day before with a timeframe of 10am to 10.15am in which she would need to be collected. But he never arrived, leading the woman to miss her flight.
The woman said she incurred multiple costs as a result, including the cost of travel the next day, a shuttle to the airport and putting her dogs in a kennel.
She also paid for ferry tickets for her and her boyfriend to go on a holiday at a separate time to visit her sons, and argued she should be reimbursed for the cost of his ticket.
The woman testified that she had entered into a “verbal contract” with her partner that he would take her to the airport and look after her dogs.
She claimed the man “enjoyed staying at her house” as he had looked after her dogs in the past.
But the tribunal referee Krysia Cowie said for an agreement to be enforceable there needed to be an intention to create a “legally binding relationship”.
“Partners, friends and colleagues make social arrangements, but it is unlikely they can be legally enforced unless the parties perform some act that demonstrates an intention that they will be bound by their promises,” she wrote.
“When friends fail to keep their promises, the other person may suffer a financial consequence but it may be that they cannot be compensated for that loss.
“There are many examples of friends who have let their friend down, however, the courts have maintained that it is a non-recoverable loss unless the promise went beyond being a favour between friends and become a promise that they intend to be bound by.”
Cowie found that the nature of the promises were “exchanged as a normal give and take in an intimate relationship” and there was “nothing that indicated an intention between the parties” for the woman’s boyfriend to be bound by his promises.
“The parties did not take any steps to show an intention to take the agreement out of a promise made between friends and to create legally binding consequences,” she wrote.
“Although a promise was made, it falls short of being a contract. It forms part of the everyday family and domestic relationship agreements that are not enforceable in the disputes tribunal.”
According to the order, the boyfriend sent an email saying he would not attend the tribunal hearing and did not answer a follow-up call from the tribunal referee.
The claim was dismissed.