Spandeck Engineering (S) Pte Ltd v Yong Qiang Construction

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judgment Date: 20 April 1999
• Date: 20 April 1999
• Docket Number: District Court Appeal No 74 of
• Court: High Court (Singapore)

Spandeck Engineering (S) Pte Ltd

Plaintiff

and

Yong Qiang Construction

Defendant

[1999] SGHC 98

Amarjeet Singh JC

District Court Appeal No 74 of 1998

High Court

Civil Procedure–Judgments and orders–Default judgment–Plaintiff claiming retention moneys under building subcontract–Principles governing exercise of discretion to set aside default judgment–Whether judgment should be set aside

The plaintiff was the subcontractor for a building project under an agreement with the defendant. The agreement stipulated that the defendant would release all retention moneys to the plaintiff within three months from completion and that payments would be based on final site measurements. Subsequently, the plaintiff averred that the defendant failed to release the retention moneys and issued a writ of summons against the defendant. The defendant entered an appearance but failed to file its defence on time. Judgment in default of defence was entered against it. This default judgment was later set aside by the deputy registrar but, upon appeal to the district judge, the default judgment was reinstated. The defendant then appealed to the High Court, arguing that, from preliminary measurements based on “as-built” drawings, no further sums were due to the plaintiff. The plaintiff argued that actual site measurements showed that it was entitled to the retention sum and also produced a payment voucher which confirmed the sum of $62,275.51 as being the retention sum due to it.

Held, dismissing the appeal:

(1) A judgment in default might be set aside if the defendant could show that it had an arguable defence which had a real prospect of success and carried some degree of conviction: at [16].

(2) Here, the defence did not have a real prospect of success nor did it carry some degree of conviction. The defendant had carried out site measurements of the work done with its quantity surveyor and its calculations of work done and amounts due were accurate figures and not rough estimates. The sum in the payment voucher was thus an exact sum. Further, there were no documents showing that there would later be a remeasurement based on “as-built” drawings that was contrary to the agreement which referred to site measurements: at [16] and [17].

Abdul Gaffer bin Fathil v Chua Kwang Yong [1994] 3 SLR (R) 1056; [1995] 1 SLR 484 (folld)

Ravi Chelliah (Cooma Lau & Loh) for the appellant

Ramalingam Kasi (Raj Kumar & Rama) for the respondent.

Amarjeet Singh JC

1 The plaintiffs carry on the business of building...