Fraudulently signed contract Vodacom

[Heisenborg]

The clerk did not sign on the purchaser's behalf. The purchaser had already signed the contract in his own capacity and agreed with the conditions as stated.

And if a contract requires the customer to initial each page but a clerk does it after the fact you think its ok? God i hope i never have to deal with the likes of you in my life.

 

[DA-LION-619]

This is how illegal sim swops take place...

 

[Arthur]

And if a contract requires the customer to initial each page but a clerk does it after the fact you think its ok? God i hope i never have to deal with the likes of you in my life.

You are a real hoot. Did you not read that in this case the customer did in fact initial each page?

The way you read leads me to suspect you have the same problem. Always someone else's fault, eh. If you can't stick to your word and perform contracts as you freely agree them, or renegotiate them as agreed, then you're clearly not up to responsible contracts. Your word doesn't count for much. With that sort of approach you'll never amount to much.

 

[Paul Hjul]

I am not seeing any indication in the OP that supports the premise that any fraudulent endorsement took place.

the OP avers that:

TO MY SHOCK, I NOTICED THAT THE CUSTOMER ACCEPTANCE NEXT TO THE PARAGRAPHS WERE INITIALLED BY SOMEONE AT THE SHOP AND NOT MYSELF. I signed the bottom of the page but never initialled the paragraphs. The store now sent the query to Vodacom Legal and does not want to comment further.

He does not aver that the person who initialled initialled the OPs initials (and if they did that they do not have the same initials). He does not state that that section requires that the customer sign or initial an acceptance.

What is stated is that an agent (of some shape or form) of one of the parties to a contract made an endorsement onto a contract document that he is has a problem with. Now he has every right to query the matter and to await feedback from the other party for an explanation, but I don't see a basis to assume - yet alone allege - fraud. Tardiness and incompetence on the part of "Vodacom legal" is a different allegation altogether - and the evidence of that is not hard to find.

All we can establish on the facts presented is that the person who explains or who reads the terms for acceptance signs or initials and that staff are required to identify that they complied with various terms. An act of fraud requires deception and nothing has been suggested of a deception in the least. If the documentation is misleading by virtue of an ambiguity and the record keeper knowingly relies on a misleading memorial then you have fraud but at this juncture all that we have is that the OP is unhappy with the manner in which the record is kept which can be clarified by appending to the document in question an annotation.

 

[Heisenborg]

You are a real hoot. Did you not read that in this case the customer did in fact initial each page?

The way you read leads me to suspect you have the same problem. Always someone else's fault, eh. If you can't stick to your word and perform contracts as you freely agree them, or renegotiate them as agreed, then you're clearly not up to responsible contracts. Your word doesn't count for much. With that sort of approach you'll never amount to much.

Well ok then

 

[Heisenborg]

I am not seeing any indication in the OP that supports the premise that any fraudulent endorsement took place.

the OP avers that:


He does not aver that the person who initialled initialled the OPs initials (and if they did that they do not have the same initials). He does not state that that section requires that the customer sign or initial an acceptance.

What is stated is that an agent (of some shape or form) of one of the parties to a contract made an endorsement onto a contract document that he is has a problem with. Now he has every right to query the matter and to await feedback from the other party for an explanation, but I don't see a basis to assume - yet alone allege - fraud. Tardiness and incompetence on the part of "Vodacom legal" is a different allegation altogether - and the evidence of that is not hard to find.

All we can establish on the facts presented is that the person who explains or who reads the terms for acceptance signs or initials and that staff are required to identify that they complied with various terms. An act of fraud requires deception and nothing has been suggested of a deception in the least. If the documentation is misleading by virtue of an ambiguity and the record keeper knowingly relies on a misleading memorial then you have fraud but at this juncture all that we have is that the OP is unhappy with the manner in which the record is kept which can be clarified by appending to the document in question an annotation.

But would it be enforceable if the signatory wasn't the customer or is it ok as long as he signed the last page?

 

[Arthur]

Thanks, Paul. We breathe again.

I do so hate these combox wars.

 

[Paul Hjul]

But would it be enforceable if the signatory wasn't the customer or is it ok as long as he signed the last page?

a contract isn't enforceable because of a signature, it is enforcable because of the parties meeting minds

the endorsement of specific paragraphs or the document as a whole is proper evidence of this - and frequently written contracts introduce a term to require the contractual relationship to be held exclusively in writing [I actually had a very frustrating experience with Vodacom's inability to understand their own contractual structure a few years ago] and so on - and therefore if there is a specific term to be agreed to would have both parties signing. I don't know what current VC contract documentation looks like but I imagine that they work on the customer signing at various places and the representative (store employee) signing as well. The sight of only one signature at a point is evidence of the absence of the other, so if anything the only thing which can be read from the document is that the clerk alleges that he/she explained stuff to the customer (checkbox processing) and that to confirm that the contract is in order to verify the endorsement by the client at the end.

There are on the facts three innocent explanations and only one explanation which suggests fraud on the part of the store - not Vodacom - and if there is fraud on the part of the store Vodacom is as much a victim as the customer and will probably take a while to investigate.

 

[xrapidx]

TO MY SHOCK, I NOTICED THAT THE CUSTOMER ACCEPTANCE NEXT TO THE PARAGRAPHS WERE INITIALLED BY SOMEONE AT THE SHOP AND NOT MYSELF

Please explain why said clerk signed where he did on a contracted which has nothing to do with him?

Because the seller probably has a very large experience of people saying that they never read all the terms and conditions despite having signed the contract, so the seller establishes internal processes to ensure that customers are alerted to those terms, precisely so that every query at the storefront doesn't have to be referred back to Legal at great trouble and cost.

None of these internal processes have anything to do with the purchaser's responsibility. If you agree to sign a written contract, it is your responsibility to ensure that you know and understand all the terms set by the seller. If you do not agree to them, then don't sign. No contract comes into existence.

You didn't answer the question?

 

[Arthur]

Substantively, the purchaser fully agreed to all the seller's terms, as is evidenced by his signature on each page of a written contract. I am sure he also signed in full on the final signature page where he warrants that he has read and agreed to all the terms and conditions in the whole written agreement.

That the sales assistant, whether acting as the seller's agent or courier, erroneously or wrongly endorsed certain clauses but without modifying them, cannot alone be taken as evidence of deception. Any court, after first considering the agreement in toto and finding substantive causa and a meeting of minds, would then look whether any specific endorsement or initialling at specified places was an essential term of agreement as written. And even if the written agreement is technically defective or vitiated in the manner averred by the purchaser/OP AND that clause is an essential term of the contract, there are various remedies at law for both parties. An essential terms means a term that, were it not present or ignored in performance, would have prevented the parties from being ad idem - and that is patently not possible in this case.

The sad reality is that it's probably just not worth the seller's while to drag this out and tie up resources. We'll all end up paying a little bit more to cover the costs of another contract breach.

 

[Paul Hjul]

Substantively, the purchaser fully agreed to all the seller's terms, as is evidenced by his signature on each page of a written contract. I am sure he also signed in full on the final signature page where he warrants that he has read and agreed to all the terms and conditions in the whole written agreement.

That the sales assistant, whether acting as the seller's agent or courier, erroneously or wrongly endorsed certain clauses but without modifying them, cannot alone be taken as evidence of deception. Any court, after first considering the agreement in toto and finding substantive causa and a meeting of minds, would then look whether any specific endorsement or initialling at specified places was an essential term of agreement as written. And even if the written agreement is technically defective or vitiated in the manner averred by the purchaser/OP AND that clause is an essential term of the contract, there are various remedies at law for both parties. An essential terms means a term that, were it not present or ignored in performance, would have prevented the parties from being ad idem - not possible in this case.

The sad reality is that it's probably just not worth the seller's while to drag this out and tie up resources. We'll all end up paying a little bit more to cover the costs of another contract breach.

however this is a good case to make for a cooling off period in consumer credit agreement ...

- it is in the interests of the administration of justice that buyers remorse not clog the roll
- it is in the interests of parties not privy to a contract not to be burdened by the costs of badly granted credit
- it is in the interests of shareholders to a credit provider to have a more accurate reflection of the value of the debtors book

 

[Arthur]

however this is a good case to make for a cooling off period in consumer credit agreement ...

- it is in the interests of the administration of justice that buyers remorse not clog the roll
- it is in the interests of parties not privy to a contract not to be burdened by the costs of badly granted credit
- it is in the interests of shareholders to a credit provider to have a more accurate reflection of the value of the debtors book

Of course.

Those are pragmatic accommodations because people so readily go back on their agreements. It's a sad state of affairs, daily made worse by ignorant people rushing into agreements they neither understand or care to understand.

The operative word in your interest catalogue is administration. Justice is not served because we allow easy exit from private treaties because the cost of handling breaches is too high.

It engenders a culture of non-accountability and non-responsibility. And that feeds straight into our politics, where people demand as right the patrimony of others.

 

[Paul Hjul]

agreed but it is very easy to establish that the mess starts with General Law Amendment Acts that were advocated for by line of credit providers

both English and Roman Dutch law have traditionally held deed external to salesman presented contracts as necessary for a line of credit (the distinction between a tab and banco credit) which was removed to expedite commerce

don't get me wrong the NCA is an absolute disgrace but the affording of a line of credit involves a lot more meeting of minds than the consumer credit industry has utilized and the expedited processes that have been written into the magistrates courts structure to advantage the commercial enterprise of credit necessitate a careful look at first principles

 

[Arthur]

Yes, credit providers were much more adept than consumers at playing 'the system' to their own advantage and almost always at the consumer's disadvantage. Their iniquitous practices - or at least those of the shadier side of the industry (cannot put them all there) - arise precisely from the same literalist 'technicality' thinking about contracts that are evinced elsewhere in this and other threads. Their 'operators' manipulated phrasings in law to 'spot the gap' and fleece ordinary people, and that's disgusting, and they have had their reward.

People seem to approach contracts as a zero-sum game of one-upmanship. Perhaps it has always been so, or at least since the Nominalists intruded their thinking into jurisprudence and all our cultural institutions. And in our democratic age, where we've decided to have Caesars and tribunes who know little to nothing about the history of jurisprudential thought and practice, all the ad hoc measures Caesar comes up with only end up exacerbating the problem elsewhere ... and so the entire legal order is progressively undermined, with more and more ad hoc 'corrections' at the steering wheel and less and less regard for the engine, drivetrain and wheels.

Little wonder that a deep malaise seems to be settling over our civilisation. Ordinary people feel increasingly disempowered, mere ciphers in a mechanism that is increasingly dysfunctional.

It is because this descent into darkness is so unnecessary that I rail with such passion against those who - unwittingly, or at least unthinkingly - contribute to the general breakdown by not honouring their word and performing on private treaties freely entered into.

In this present instance, it's not as if the OP's problem is that some questionable Ts&Cs were concealed in the fine print or couched in obscure legalese, or that some sharp practice by the seller is being averred. He agrees entirely with the contract in all its substantive elements, but wants out because it no longer suits him and so he raises irrelevant technical nominalist deficiencies. It is this sort of literalistic thinking that make a healthy and robust commercial life increasingly impossible.

So, roll on the Revolution.

(No more, I promise.)

 

[ld13]

My word. I was just flooded with the use of quite a few english words that I never knew existed.

 

[Rocket-Boy]

Arthur is correct, the signature at the bottom is acceptance of the contract as a whole including the terms and conditions.
The initials generally dont even have an underlined section, its just an initial next to a paragraph.
The only possible outcome in favour of the client would be tampering with the contract after it was initially signed and agreed upon.

 

[Captain-Justice]

No legal requirement to do so. That's just a courtesy provided by the vendor, which in this case was not extended. That neglect has zero legal effect.

Caveat subscriptor.

Arthur is wrong. The clerk forged the signature because he must have realised he didn't comply to S49 of CPA.

49. (1) Any notice to consumers or provision of a consumer agreement that purports to—
(a) limit in any way the risk or liability of the supplier or any other person;
(b) constitute an assumption of risk or liability by the consumer;
(c) impose an obligation on the consumer to indemnify the supplier or any other person for any cause; or
(d) be an acknowledgement of any fact by the consumer, must be drawn to the attention of the consumer in a manner and form that satisfies the formal requirements of subsections (3) to (5).

SS(4) The fact, nature and effect of the provision or notice contemplated in subsection
(1) must be drawn to the attention of the consumer
(a) in a conspicuous manner and form that is likely to attract the attention of an ordinarily alert consumer, having regard to the circumstances

 

[Captain-Justice]

My word. I was just flooded with the use of quite a few english words that I never knew existed.

Get used to it, we have two show boats here who like talking from the stratosphere to our mere mortals

Glitzy words with no substance.

 

[Arthur]

No, you're wrong CJ. And a fundamentalist to boot. You quote chapter and verse and know not what they mean or how they apply. We've been through all this before. So tedious.

 

[Captain-Justice]

No, you're wrong CJ. And a fundamentalist to boot. You quote chapter and verse and know not what they mean or how they apply. We've been through all this before. So tedious.

And what's your spin, O Highness and knower of All?