Virtual agreement
13 September 2012
As there have been no British court rulings to date on the legality of e-mail contracts, purchasers have been forced to look further afield for legal precedents governing Internet commerce, Paul Abbiati explains
A recent question on the Adviser page queried the legality of electronic documents compared with traditional signed purchase orders. Although there has not been a court decision in the UK on the legality of a contract issued via e-mail, there is international, European and domestic legislation legalising such contracts.
The closest that our legal system came to...