Seller Beware Landscaping: Understanding Caveat Venditor and Contractor Liability
The term ‘Seller Beware’ or ‘Caveat Venditor’ in legal parlance, is the common phrase used to warn suppliers and sellers of products and services to be aware of their obligations to their customers and clients. Any problems, shortfalls in quality or misrepresentation of facts, safety or other degenerative quality of a material or product and the onus will fall upon the seller of that service or product.
Although suppliers may have recourse to claim against the manufacturers of a product in the event of a failure, in the first instance, any claim will be against the supplier, as the first port of call when assessing compensation or redress. (The customer having no contract, express or implied, with the manufacturer in the first instance)
Unlike Caveat Emptor, or Buyer Beware, it is not reasonable for an unqualified customer to know or understand the qualities of a product, leaving such matters to the professional – the designer or landscaper – to make such decisions on their behalf regarding suitability for purpose, either as a stand-alone item or part of a construction project.
Caveat Venditor means that sellers are held accountable for the quality of their products – a term that means the product sold to the customer, which expressly means the seller become the vendor, accepting all responsibility for their choice.
It can also involve taking great care when describing something in a quotation as being what it actually is.
For example, a term in common use is the supply of ‘corten steel’ in a construction or design plan annotation. Corten steel is only corten steel if it is manufactured by the firm Cor-Ten in the USA (Registered Trade Mark). All other such products should be correctly titled as ‘Weathering’ steel. There are varying degrees of rust inherent in different weathering steels, and any issues with discolouration or rust from water run-off onto (say) paving, created by non-Cor-Ten steel could result in an expensive claim against the specifier if the wrong name was provided in a quotation.
Other historical claim cases include the supply of turf from Rolawn. Rolawn protect their name and quality of the turf products, but only those grades of turf with the Trade name of Rowlan are allowed to be called as such. Other grades, e.g. Easylawn, may be sold by Rolawn, delivered by Rolawn lorries and invoices paid to Rolawn Ltd, but may not be referred to as Rolawn, as it a sub-standard grade from their primary quality products.
Be aware too, that if you use Artificial Intelligence to provide you with solutions, ensure that you state this fact, clearly, in your documentation, otherwise you may be held responsible for any incorrect information.
Always ensure that you maintain records, keep all documents provided on a project for six years by way of protecting yourself from falling foul of Caveat Venditor. (See also Caveat Emptor)
