OCR A2 Law - The Law of Contract - Formation of a Contract - Termination of an Offer (4)

5b. Revocation by 3rd party: If the offer is to be revoked by a 3rd party then revocation is only valid if the 3rd party is reliable. A case to illustrate this is "Dickenson v Dodds". Here a mutual friend was present who revoked the offer. This was a valid revocation.

AO2: However, it can be difficult to ascertain what "reliable" constitutes to.

5c. Unilateral contracts and recvocation: Unilateral contracts and revocation is only valid before performance starts. A case to illustrate this is "Errington v Errington & Woods". In this case an offer was made for a houses deeds upon payment of a mortgage. This was a valid contract as the couple paid the mortgage and the offer couldn't be revoked.5d. Adverts: But, in the case of adverts, offers can be revoked with the same publicity and the same medium. Unforunately, there is no english authority regarding this, therefore, we only use persuasive precedent. A case to illustrate this is "Shuey vs US". In this case an "offer" was revoked as the same publicity was used. AO2: This can cause problems as the revocation may not be seen by the same people as it phsyically impossible, also the offeree's may have already started performance.

Final AO2: Problems have arisen when terminating an offer as it tends to leave the law uncertain, unpredictable and unreliable. However, the judges/courts have tried to interpret past precedent when understanding the dynamics or different cases, but the law in this area isn't very flexible.