What is Frustration?
Frustration is defined as the feeling of being upset or annoyed as a result of being unable to change or achieve something.
But today we are not going to talk about the normal Frustration, we are going to talk about Frustration in legal term.
So, what does Frustration means?
Frustration basically occurs when there is an existence of a contract which cannot be perform due to unforeseeable circumstances such as act of god, etc.
For example, Mr. X bought a ticket to Ms. S’s concert. Here there is a contract between Mr. X and Ms. S. However, 3 days before the concert, there was a fire burning down the Ms. S’s Concert Premise. In this case, Mr. X has already performed his part of the contract where he paid for the concert, however Ms. S is unable to perform her part of the contract because there is no premise for her to perform her concert.
In this case, if Ms. S is sued by Mr. X, she could raise the defense of Frustration where it is impossible to perform the contract and the Contract is void. Mr. X is able to get back the money he paid for.
Currently, there is a COVID-19 Pandemic where in order to stop the virus from spreading, most of the Government in the world has implement the restrictive movement order where it encourages the citizen to stay at home and most of the business premises are to be closed.
While, this is might be good way to stop the virus from spreading. This order directly affects the economy in a way that business is unable to operate, people are unable to pay rent, or their monthly commitment, especially those employers. Some employers are already making losses before the pandemic, now they are forced to close.
In this situation, if you are one of the parties above who is burden by the abovementioned reasons, it is probably a good time now to read your agreements or contract to see whether you are relieve from performing the contract or to check whether there are any frustration clause in the agreement.
If there is no frustration clause, maybe you can try negotiate with the contracting party and come to a better method or ways to perform the contract.
