[Sussex] Tie becomes unbound

[Geoffrey Teale]

And here I let the Mrs take over...

On Wednesday 12 March 2003 9:44 pm, Mark Harrison wrote:
> I would have thought that the client claiming to have been defrauded would
> need to prove that wearing suits to client meetings was, per se, evidence
> that suits were part of corporate dress.

Not so.  The fraud is in the misrepresentation of the product and only occurs 
if the company selling the product (the consultancy firm) is forcing the 
consultant to dress that way in when they would overwise have not done so.

The client need not claim they have been defrauded, it is enough to prove the 
point in law.  No actual fraud action will have occured else this would be 
considered a criminal matter.  

The hypothesis put to the court is that it can be proven that the contractual 
obligation, by implication or explicit declaration, to wear a suit could 
cause damages against the business of the consultancy firm with which it can 
be claimed the only defensible point within the law allowing a company to 
dictate dress code is nullified.

It is unlikely that any lawyer would attempt to try this case, but the thought 
behind it is the sort of excercise in legal masturbation that causes cases to 
be settled out of court.

> The obvious defence would be for the consultancy to claim that standard
> dress code was "suits for client meetings, casual otherwise".

This is not relevant.   In this matter it is the preference of the consultant 
who is the "product" of the consultancy firm that settles the matter.  Their 
is an implication is that he is the sort of person who has it in his 
character to wear a suit to work.  This aspect of character is socially 
accepted as indicating other things in a person.  If this trait is important 
enough to have an effect on whether the consultant is contracted out or not, 
then to falsify this impression of his character is a definite fraud.  If it 
is not important enough to have an effect on the contract then the firm of 
consultants have no legal right to dictate his mode of dress.

The matter of whether he wore a suit to his interview for the firm is however 
very relevant.  If he had worn a suit to his interview it would split the 
liability for any fraud between the firm and the consultant and would no 
doubt damage the consultants case.

> I, having spent most of my professional life working for big consultancies,
> would be happy to appear as an expert witness, and support the view that
> "suits for client meetings, casual otherwise" was standard working practice
> in my industry :-)

I'm afriad this is not the USA, we don't have "expert witnesses" and cases 
like this would be unlikely to be brought before a jury.  Simply having a 
career in consultancy would not validate your opinion to be entered as 
evidence before a judge in this matter.

Please note that this advice is given merely as a theoretical exercise and has 
not be approached as paid work.  Any action taken by persons reading this 
material is a matter of their own liability and this document may not be 
taken as reference.

-- 
GJT
tealeg at member.fsf.org
Free Software Foundation