AP Energy & Resources Pte Ltd v Blissmore Holdings Pte Ltd

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Mavis Chionh Sze Chyi
• Judgment Date: 29 September 2006
• Neutral Citation: [2006] SGDC 215
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Published date: 01 November 2006
• Year: 2006
• Plaintiff Counsel: Joseph Lee / Alyn Tai (Rodyk & Davidson)
• Defendant Counsel: Prasanna (Hoh Law Corporation)
• Citation: [2006] SGDC 215

29 September 2006

District Judge Mavis Chionh:

The background

The dispute in this case arises from a Letter of Undertaking dated 31 August 2005 provided by the defendants to the plaintiffs.

2. It is not disputed that the salient terms of this Letter of Undertaking were as follows:

a) That the defendants were to arrange for a Standby Letter of Credit (‘SBLC’) for US$920,000 in the plaintiffs’ favour in consideration of the plaintiffs advancing to the defendants a sum of US$100,000;

b) That the said SBLC was to be “a valid Standby Letter of Credit… as per the format described in Appendix 2 of AP/MP/0805”;

c) That the defendants would repay the plaintiffs the entire advance of US$100,000 within 5 days upon the plaintiffs’ demand if a valid SBLC in the prescribed format were not issued within 5 days of the advance being made.

3. It is also not disputed that the plaintiffs paid the defendants the sum of US$100,000 on 31 August 2005 (paragraph 4 and page 9 of Ho Chee Hon’s affidavit of 28 March 2006).

4. It is not disputed that the plaintiffs wrote to the defendants on 20 October 2005 to demand the repayment of the US$100,000 on the ground that the defendants had failed to provide a valid SBLC by the required deadline (paragraph 6 of Ho Chee Hon’s affidavit of 28 March 2006). It is not disputed that the defendants have todate refused to repay the US$100,000.

5. Although the plaintiffs’ writ of summons alleged that the due date for delivery of the SBLC was 5 September 2005 (paragraph 5 of the statement of claim), for the purposes of these proceedings, the plaintiffs said they accepted that the deadline was 9 September 2005 and not 5 September (paragraph 7 of the plaintiffs’ written submissions on appeal).

6. The plaintiffs applied for summary judgement on their claim. The plaintiffs asserted that the defendants failed to delivery a valid SBLC by 9 September or at all. They claimed the sum of US$100,000 with interest and costs. In their defence, the defendants alleged that the deadline for delivery of the SBLC had been “varied” from 9 September 2005 to “the end of September 2005”; and that they “had delivered a valid SBLC in the prescribed format on 21 September 2005, which was within the agreed period” (paragraphs 2 and 4 of the defence).

7. The learned deputy registrar hearing the plaintiffs’ application ordered that the defendants were to have leave to defend conditional upon their providing a banker’s guarantee for US$100,000 on terms acceptable to the plaintiffs by 4 pm on 3 August 2006. In the event of the defendants’ default in providing the banker’s guarantee, judgement was to be entered for the plaintiffs.

8. The defendants appealed against the DR’s decision. I dismissed their appeal. My reasons were as follows.

The reasons for my decision

9. The plaintiffs denied that there was any variation of the deadline of 9 September 2005. The plaintiffs also asserted that even assuming there had been a variation of the deadline to an unspecified date “at the end of September 2005” as alleged by the defendants, the defendants had failed to provide a valid SBLC as they were required to do by the Letter of Undertaking. This was because the defendants had procured a letter of credit from “First National of America Corp.” (‘FNAC’) which was stated to be capable of authentication by “Mutual Bank” of Chicago (page 18 of Ramdas Nair’s...