Breach of contract claims and negligence claims – beware time limits
It is one thing having a strong actionable legal claim and another thing to be in compliance with court rules on time limits and such matters. There are obvious and sound reasons why there need to be limitation periods for claims, as otherwise there would be no certainty.
A recent case highlights that once a party has “sufficient knowledge” of a breach of contract or negligence, they need to be vigilant and even perhaps diarise, as lawyers generally due, the expiry of the limitation period to ensure that claims are not statute barred under the Limitation Act.
With breach of contract claims the limitation period is 6 years for breach of contract, and, subject to exceptions, 3 years for a negligence claim. In this case, the claimants were unable to pursue sizeable claims for flood damage to their property due to being out of time, and the court decided that they had sufficient knowledge of the breach of contract and negligence at an earlier date than they argued was the case.