I find it sad when people learn a lesson the hard way. On the other hand, I understand why the Court, and the New York Legislature set up the rules in this fashion: simply put, if they allowed unlicensed contractors to still get paid for work that requires a license, then that would effectively abrogate [...]
I was recently contacted by a man who was dealt with unfairly by a much larger company he was trying to do business with. The bigger company, on a whim, decided that they didn’t want to do business with him anymore, so they came up with every reason they could muster – some legitimate, some [...]
Today’s New York Daily News is reporting that Victoria’s Secret has been sued for inducing the Chinese supplier for a New York and New Jersey-based shoe company to break its 25 year relationship with the shoe company in favor of an exclusive deal with Victoria’s Secret. Now, let’s not be naive; the reason the story [...]
If the unsubstantiated claims of this plaintiff are actually true, then I feel bad for the plaintiff. But, as noted by the Court, therein lies the problem: the allegations are unsubstantiated. In Lecce Penn Co. SPA v. Adrenaline Marketing & Promotions, Inc., the plaintiff sued in breach of contract and fraud to recover over $300,000 [...]
Although I’m certainly no fan of the insurance industry, I can’t blame them for fighting this claim. And I don’t blame the Court for siding with them either. Recently, in Rampersant v. Nationwide Mutual Fire Ins. Co., a Brooklyn judge dismissed the lawsuit brought by a Kings County man against his auto insurer, which sought [...]
Recently, I attended a non-party deposition in a commercial litigation matter arising out of a dispute over who is the rightful owner of a particular property in New York. As is often the case, the attorney conducting the deposition was less than thrilled at the answers given by the witness. So, first he tried to [...]
As you may be aware, it has become increasingly common for employers to condition their employees’ receipt of post-employment benefits upon the employees’ agreement to abide by a strict non-compete clause. So here’s the question (which, unfortunately, occurs altogether too frequently): what if the non-compete is unreasonably and unduly restrictive (i.e., prevents you from using [...]
It seems to me that many people are under the impression that your hands are completely tied, and you have no immediate recourse to the New York State courts if your former employer breaches your severance agreement. While in many cases, e.g., where the severance plan is governed by ERISA (in which case a common [...]
Although you might think that the answer to this question is really simple – it’s when both sides have a fully signed agreement – you’d be terribly mistaken. So, here’s the rule, as recently summarized by a New York County trial court: “The requirements for formation of an enforceable contract are: (1) at least two [...]
In my earlier blog post “Why Fraudulent Concealment Claims Are So Tough to Win in New York,” I pointed out that one of the challenges of these claims is posed by contractual language that the purchaser signs stating that they didn’t rely on any representations by the seller. As a New York trial court recently [...]