HULLB 102A Contract Law Blended Learning Activity: Week 3 Objective: students will be

able to apply knowledge received on Offer & Acceptance to sets of facts and reach
conclusions. Task: In your groups, prepare an answer to the following questions on Offer &
Acceptance. The answers will be briefly discussed in a tutorial class. Please upload your
answers onto the LMS with your names and student numbers. Time: 3 hours. Question:
(a) John and Janita meet one day for some teh tarik and kuih. As they were eating,
John asked Janita, ‘Would you be interested to sell your red Myvi?’ Janita pauses and
then answers, ‘Depends on the selling price.’ ‘I might be interested to buy it if the price
was RM20,000.’ John replied. Jani then says, ‘All right, I accept your proposal.’

The issue is whether the agreement between John and Janita was a proposal or an
invitation to treat. Section 2(a) in Contract Law defines a proposal as when one person
signifies to another his willingness to do or to abstain from doing anything, with a view to
obtaining the assent of that other to the act or abstinence, he is said to make a proposal.
Regarding invitation to treat, it can be seen in the case of Gibson v Manchester City
Council, in this case, The Manchester City Council wrote to Mr.Gibson stating that the
council ‘may be prepared to sell’ the council house to him at 2180 pounds and invited him ‘
to make a formal application to buy’. Mr Gibson made a formal application as requested in
the letter. Before the process of preparation and exchange of contracts, the new council
refused to complete the sale. It was held that the council’s letter was at most an invitation to
treat. The words ‘may be prepared’ and ‘ to make a formal application to buy’ was fatal to the
contention that the letter was a contractual proposal. Mr. Gibson’s letter was a proposal and
not an acceptance.
In this case, John asked Janita if she was interested in selling her red Myvi. This is not
a proposal as he is not willing to be bound legally when he asked this question. It was merely
him seeking information. Besides, John replied that he might be interested to buy it if the
price was RM 20,000 is most likely to be an invitation to treat because he only has the
interest to buy if the condition is fulfilled. Janita accepted John’s invitation to treat. Janita is
the one who is proposing. Thus, there is no contract between them.
In conclusion, the agreement between John and Janita is merely an invitation to treat
and there is no valid contract between them.

4. Bradley, Ralph and Erin are siblings. Ralph is married and lives in a house in
Bangsar, whilst Bradley and Erin, who are both unmarried, live in a shared apartment
in Bukit Damansara.
The apartment has a mortgage over it and the repayments are made on an equal basis
amongst Bradley and Erin.
Bradley is a chef and used to run a medium sized but successful cafe. Unfortunately,
due to the pandemic and the various movement control orders, he lost a lot of business,
had to close the café and started baking at home and selling his products online.
With his income severely reduced, he fell into depression, and this caused his
relationship with Erin to deteriorate. They argued frequently about finances and often
chose not to speak to each other, except when necessary. Things got so bad that Bradley
left the apartment and moved in with Ralph.

Two days after Bradley left, Erin called him to discuss how he was going to pay for his
share of the apartment, and during the conversation, she proposed that she would pay
his share in return for a half-share of his earnings from his baking business. Bradley
agreed.

Ralph and Bradley enjoy football and are superfans of Chelsea FC. They follow the
English Premier League religiously and have dreams about visiting Stamford Bridge
one day. During a live telecast of a match, it was announced that Chelsea FC would be
making a tour that summer to Malaysia and there would be a meet and greet session for
the fans. Tickets were being offered at RM500 per person. Ralph and Bradley made
plans to attend the tour and the session, with Ralph promising to pay for Bradley’s
ticket and Bradley promising in return to buy dinner that evening and drive them to the
event and back.
Unfortunately, on the Friday before the event Bradley lent his car to a friend. He was
also saving up to buy a new watch for his girlfriend and refused to buy dinner after the
session. Ralph ended up driving them and paying for dinner. It has been half a year
since the agreement with Erin, but Bradley has not paid a single cent to her from his
earnings, although she has been making the mortgage repayments. Advise the parties
The issue in this question is whether there is a binding contract between Erin and
Ralph. This is related to domestic agreements. There is a presumption between social and
domestic agreements which is a party to a social, family, or other domestic agreement will
not be held liable in a contract unless there is positive evidence that the party intended to
enter a contractual relationship.
This could be illustrated in the case, Merritt v Merritt, the husband left his wife and
went off to live with another woman. The husband promised the wife that if the wife pays the
mortgage, he will transfer the mortgage but, in the end, the husband refused to transfer the
house. The court held that it was an intention to create legal relations because they were not
living in amenities before the promise was made. Similar to this case, Erin fell into
depression, and this caused his relationship with Erin to deteriorate. They argued frequently
about finances and often chose not to speak to each other, except when necessary. Bradley
left the apartment and moved in with Ralph before they agreed on the payment of their house.
When the promise was made, they were not living in amity and intend to bargain seriously.
In conclusion, there was an intention to create legal relations and a binding contract
between Erin and Ralph, the presumption in a social domestic agreement could be rebutted.
 In the argument between Ralph and Bradley. There is no binding agreement between
them. They enter an agreement when they are on good terms. Before that, they were living in
amity. This could be illustrated in the case Jones v P
adaptation. Therefore, the presumption to create a legal relation applies. Ralph could not get
back the money from Bradley.