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| Abstract | ||||||||||||||||||
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| (Abstract prepared by Dr. Mateusz J. Pilich, Supreme Court of the Republic of Poland)
An Italian producer of office furniture brought an action against the Polish buyer for payment of a certain sum. It claimed that several invoices were issued in year 2000 and 2001 in connection with a contract for the sale of furniture delivered to Poland and handed over to the buyer. The invoices were signed only by the seller and the buyer denied the very fact that it entered into any contract with the former. The Regional Court (Sad Rejonowy) in Wroclaw dismissed the claim. It applied Polish domestic law to the merits of the dispute. The court ruled that the claimant had not produced any evidence of a contract concluded between the parties. Its allegations alone could not suffice. Moreover, the invoices which were not accepted by the defendant did not constitute evidence of the contract. The seller’s appeal was dismissed by the District Court (Sad Okregowy). While it was true, according to the Court of the second instance, that the CISG should have been applied instead of the Polish Civil Code, the decision on the facts could not be overturned and as a result, the conclusion of the challenged judgment was correct. The seller appealed to the Supreme Court alleging, among other things, the plea of violation of Art. 4 (a) and Art. 7 (2) CISG as well as misapplication of Art. 27 (1)(1) Polish Act on PIL and as a consequence, misapplication of Art. 6 of Polish Civil Code (the rule regulating the burden of proof). In the seller’s opinion, under CISG the invoices signed by the seller are sufficient evidence of a contract for sale and the defendant had in fact paid some part of the contested debt, which was to be considered as an implied consent. The Supreme Court dismissed the seller’s claim. It held that according to precedents of the same Court, the invoices as such could not be considered a source of private law obligations and in particular of a contract for the sale of goods. Moreover, the parties were in an ongoing business relationship in various fields, like advertisement services, and the sum paid by the defendant was in fact connected with services other than the delivery of furniture. Finally, the Supreme Court observed that whereas CISG contains no express definition of a sales contract, the obligations arising from an international contract as the one regulated by CISG correspond to the model provided for in the Polish Civil Code: the seller promises to deliver goods and to transfer the title thereof to the buyer, and the buyer obliges itself to take delivery and to pay the price (Arts. 30 and 53 CISG). There was no evidence of an agreement concerning such obligations in the case at hand. |