AXA Insurance Singapore Pte Ltd v Chandran s/o Natesan

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Choo Han Teck J
• Judgment Date: 21 August 2013
• Neutral Citation: [2013] SGHC 158
• Court: High Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: Suit No 576 of 2013 (Summons No 3820 of 2013)
• Published date: 26 August 2013
• Year: 2013
• Hearing Date: 01 August 2013
• Plaintiff Counsel: K Muralidharan Pillai (Rajah & Tann LLP)
• Defendant Counsel: Defendant unrepresented and absent.
• Subject Matter: Tort,Nuisance,Private nuisance
• Citation: [2013] SGHC 158

Choo Han Teck J:

The plaintiff is a company incorporated in Singapore and carries on the business of general insurance. The defendant held a motor vehicle insurance policy (“the Policy”) in respect of his motorcycle with the licence plate number FB7639B (“the Vehicle”). The Policy was issued by the plaintiff. He purchased the policy from the plaintiff around December 2012 to cover the Vehicle from 23 November 2012 to 22 November 2013. The defendant was involved in a road accident along Dunearn Road on 8 June 2013 in which his motorcycle was hit from behind. He made a claim on his policy on 12 June 2013.

The plaintiff’s statement of claim averred that after the defendant filed his claim under the policy, he began to “persistently send emails and make phone calls to the plaintiff’s employees and external lawyers”. The plaintiff claimed that “on a number of these occasions the defendant used vulgar and threatening language”. It claimed that the defendant “embarked on a course of conduct by his email and phone calls, which was sufficiently repetitive in nature, such as to cause, and which he ought reasonably to know would cause worry, emotional distress or annoyance to the plaintiff’s employees and advisors”.

The plaintiff alleged that between 13 to 25 June 2013 (nine working days), the defendant sent 19 emails to the plaintiff’s employees and made at least seven phone calls to them; in a number of those calls vulgar and abusive language was used. The emails and calls were made not to a single person but to several different persons in the plaintiff’s employ, including: Ong Hui Fang, a customer service executive; Valencia Lee, a manager in the Motor Claims Department; Charlie Neo, an Associate Director; Dominic Ho, an assistant manager; Doina Palici-Chehab, the Chief Executive Officer; Elaine Lee, a secretary; members of the plaintiff’s Claims Service Team; and various others.

On 21 June 2013, Willy Tay, solicitors for the plaintiff at the time, wrote to the defendant telling him to stop the abusive language in his email to the plaintiff and that all correspondence henceforth should be sent to Willy Tay’s firm Ari, Goh & Partners. I should pause to point out that the subject matter that led to Willy Tay’s letter of 21 June 2013 was the claim by the defendant for payment of a “brake pad” of his Vehicle that was damaged in the accident. Willy Tay’s letter did not deter the defendant who wrote another email on 24 June 2013 using abusive language. That prompted another warning from Willy Tay on 25 June 2013 which attracted an abusive email from the defendant abusing him and threatening that he “will ensure [Willy Tay’s] bloody face is unidentified” (sic). On 27 June 2013, Willy Tay wrote to the defendant informing him that the plaintiff was giving the defendant seven days’ notice under the Policy to terminate the Policy. The plaintiff filed this writ on the next day, claiming the relief of a permanent injunction to restrain the defendant from “harassing, alarming, distressing the employees, directors, partners, servants and agents of the plaintiff and the plaintiff’s professional advisers”. In the statement of claim filed on 24 July 2013 the plaintiff pleaded that the defendant’s action amounted to the tort of nuisance in that he had thus “wrongfully interfered with the plaintiff’s use and quiet enjoyment of the plaintiff’s leased premises”.

On 1 July 2013, Mr Muralidharan Pillai (“Mr Murali”), counsel for the plaintiff applied and obtained an ex parte injunction on an urgent basis on the ground that the defendant was “diagnosed as psychotic” and had threatened not only the plaintiff but its lawyers as well. Mr Murali returned on 1 August 2013 to enter final judgment against the defendant. The defendant was unrepresented and absent. Counsel had no instructions to mention for the defendant but informed the court that the defendant had accepted terms set out in counsel’s letter of 12 July 2013 and consented to have judgment entered against him. The relevant paragraphs of Mr Murali’s letter of 12 July 2013 were as follows: 4. Our client takes a very serious view of your actions against their employees. As responsible employer, our client owes a duty to ensure that their employees operate in a safe working environment. Your actions against our client’s employees, especially our client’s female employees, have caused them much alarm and distress. Full details of what you have done against them were provided in the court documents (particularly, the affidavit of Mr James Patrick Shanahan dated 28 June 2013) which were served on you on 2 July 2013. It is because of your actions that our client sought and obtained a Court Order to prevent you from further harassing their employees.

…

6. After due consideration of your personal circumstances, our client proposes as follows: (1) You consent to our client entering judgment against you. This will mean existing injunction preventing you from harassing our client will be made permanent. This means that you will be permanently restrained, whether by yourself or by instructing or encouraging or permitting any other, from harassing, alarming, distressing the employees, directors, partners, servants, officers and agents of the Plaintiff and the Plaintiff’s professional advisers (including but not limited to Rajah & Tann LLP and Ari, Goh & Partners) by making or sending abusive, intimidating or threatening communications to them whether verbally, in writing or by conduct in any form. The defendant replied by email on the same day, 12 July 2013, to Mr Murali. His email is important and set out in full as follows:

Received with thanks of your letter dtd 12 July 2013. As indicated, I hereby am willing to conform n oblige to the terms n conditions stated therein paragraph-6. However, I also take a serious view n rebut your comments in phara-4. Pls tell your clients that I do give due n utmost respect to womens as I am also married to a wife, who is a Nrsing Manager, in the women hospital, n also have a grown up daughter too. I do know how to treat ladies n manage my manners with them. Pls tell Mr Patrick that it was his subordinate Ms Valencia who started this unpleasant n ugly episode, otherwise your client may not have to incur so much of legal costs. I believe at least reaching to about 8k, paying both lawyers legal costs n disbursement. My lawyer Ms Ying, indeed told me that AXA is a very reasonable insurer unlike other insurers over here. She cited some of the matters about my case on how AXA contemplate n finally give in to all my requests.

Therefore, pls don tell me that your client suffered huge financial loss just becoz they have to take up a court action to protect their staffs. If both u n willy had advised your client properly without the need to engage your services then possibly they may NOT have to lose a substantial loss in the handling of my matter.

If only Charlie has assigned the case to Dominic than to Valencia then this matter would NOT have cropped up. I can understand Valencia is a woman n does not have any knowledge about motorcycle, but then it should be Charlies’ responsibility to assign my claim matter to Dominic, instead of Valencia, as he is expected to have some knowledge about motorcycles.

Hence, pls tell Patrick NOT to ‘tai chi’ or throw the ball at me, becoz as a policy holder, I expect the claim handling staff to be very well versed with damaged vehicle insurance...