Collateral Warranties - are they contagious?
Authors
Citation
Building journal Hong Kong China, Jun, 1992, pp. 108-111
Abstract
Collateral warranties have become an all-too-familiar part of the construction process in the UK in recent years, a development resented by consultants and contractors but necessary to satisfy the real concerns of employers, their tenants, purchasers and financiers. Owing to changes in judicial thinking during the 1980s, these three parties were left without the safety net of a right of action at common law against designers and builders in the event that defects appeared in their buildings.
Consequently, while the courts were whittling away the protection afforded to such parties at common law, those parties were busy filling it back in themselves through contract. It remains to be seen whether this phenomenon will be confined to the UK or whether Hong Kong will also catch the warranty bug.
Michael Webster, an English solicitor with Baker & McKenzie, Solicitors, briefly describes the basic form and purpose of warranties, their reasons for being and the consequences of their use in the UK and, potentially, in Hong Kong.
(1) What are collateral warranties?
(2) Why are warranties required?
(3) Who are parties to warranties?
(4) What form do warranties take?
(5) Effect on construction industry
(6) Why not Hong Kong?
(7) Conclusion
Description
Subject
Type
Article
Format
Date
1992
Language
en