Woman sues her boyfriend for not driving her to the airport
A woman in New Zealand sued her boyfriend for failing to take her to the airport as planned and spoiling her trip with friends to a concert.
The woman, who has been identified only as CL in legal documents, said her boyfriend, HG, had offered to drive her to the airport but did not show up, causing her to miss her flight.
CL and HG had been in a relationship for more than six years until the dispute arose, the court document said.
The woman claimed he had breached a verbal contract in not turning up, and that, unable to reach the airport in time by other means, she ended up having to buy a flight the next day to meet her friends as planned. The court document did not say where she had been going or what the concert was that she had planned to attend.
Numerous other costs
CL said it was not just the trip to the airport that her boyfriend had let her down on. He had also agreed to stay at her house to look after her dogs, but after he failed to do that too, she had to pay for a kennel for them.
The filing in the small-claims court detailed numerous other costs, including having to take a shuttle bus to the airport.
The woman also wanted compensation for a ferry ticket she had bought him on a separate occasion which he had not paid her back for.
However, the man’s many alleged infractions were not enough to sway the tribunal, which remained unimpressed by the woman’s claims.
‘Non-recoverable loss’
It noted that “partners, friends and colleagues make social arrangements, but it is unlikely they can be legally enforced”, unless there was evidence to suggest the parties had intended to form a legally binding agreement.
“When friends fail to keep their promises, the other person may suffer a financial consequence but it may be that they cannot be compensated for that loss,” the tribunal ruled as it dismissed the case.
It is not the first time such a case has reached the courts, as Krysia Cowie, the tribunal referee, noted: “There are many examples of friends who have let their friend down; however, the courts have maintained that it is a non-recoverable loss unless the promise went beyond being a favour between friends and became a promise that they intended to be bound by.”
