8 ms·

Wouldn't all contracts still remain valid if the company got bought out?

by tomp 7y ago

lozenge 7y ago
Contracts need consideration. Basically if the company stops charging you, they don't owe you anything. This is also backed up by explicit clauses that say this. The exception would be if somebody paid a "lifetime guarantee fee" initially to get that promise of service.
- gowld 7y ago
  All the money pay since the first day was the consideration. > Basically if the company stops charging you, they don't owe you anything No. If they refund the money you paid, or whatever they can convince a judge is the value of the lifetime guarantee (the difference between TYM and GPM prices forever, converted to Net Present Value), they don't owe you anything. The only right thing to do is to refund all past customer payments, or refund the "value of the lifetime guarantee" (with treble damages for willfully violating the contract?), and add a "lifetime guarantee fee" in future contracts with clear wording to avoud the problem in the future.
  - tomatocracy 7y ago
    If the value of what you got from them is worth more than what you paid, then they can't just refund you what you paid and say "we didn't mean it". They'd be liable for damages for the value to you of the service and you might even be able to get an order for specific performance. A good example of this is the story of the small number of ticket American Airlines sold in the late 80s/early 90s which offered unlimited first-class air travel anywhere in the world for life. They eventually had to resort buying them back from those customers for rather more than had originally been paid for the tickets.
- close04 7y ago
  And even then you would only get the fee back. Getting any compensation for damages caused by the contract being broken is pretty much impossible in a case like this. It's hard to assign a value to that "lifetime guarantee" especially since the lifetime of this kind of service is determined "reasonably", not the life of the service or the user. It's unlikely that it's longer than 10 years so one might at best be compensated for another 4 years' worth of losing the price guarantee. At maybe $1 per month (assuming this is what they'll charge extra in the future) and given any legal costs this boils down to nothing. I imagine Google will not go further than giving a gift card to those users and call it a day.
nradov 7y ago
Generally yes, unless the contract contains an explicit exclusionary clause about change of corporate control.

Wouldn't all contracts still remain valid if the company got bought out?

by tomp 7y ago

Wouldn't all contracts still remain valid if the company got bought out?

Contracts need consideration. Basically if the company stops charging you, they don't owe you anything. This is also backed up by explicit clauses that say this. The exception would be if somebody paid a "lifetime guarantee fee" initially to get that promise of service.

gowld 7y ago
All the money pay since the first day was the consideration. > Basically if the company stops charging you, they don't owe you anything No. If they refund the money you paid, or whatever they can convince a judge is the value of the lifetime guarantee (the difference between TYM and GPM prices forever, converted to Net Present Value), they don't owe you anything. The only right thing to do is to refund all past customer payments, or refund the "value of the lifetime guarantee" (with treble damages for willfully violating the contract?), and add a "lifetime guarantee fee" in future contracts with clear wording to avoud the problem in the future.
- tomatocracy 7y ago
  If the value of what you got from them is worth more than what you paid, then they can't just refund you what you paid and say "we didn't mean it". They'd be liable for damages for the value to you of the service and you might even be able to get an order for specific performance. A good example of this is the story of the small number of ticket American Airlines sold in the late 80s/early 90s which offered unlimited first-class air travel anywhere in the world for life. They eventually had to resort buying them back from those customers for rather more than had originally been paid for the tickets.
close04 7y ago
And even then you would only get the fee back. Getting any compensation for damages caused by the contract being broken is pretty much impossible in a case like this. It's hard to assign a value to that "lifetime guarantee" especially since the lifetime of this kind of service is determined "reasonably", not the life of the service or the user. It's unlikely that it's longer than 10 years so one might at best be compensated for another 4 years' worth of losing the price guarantee. At maybe $1 per month (assuming this is what they'll charge extra in the future) and given any legal costs this boils down to nothing. I imagine Google will not go further than giving a gift card to those users and call it a day.

nradov 7y ago

Generally yes, unless the contract contains an explicit exclusionary clause about change of corporate control.