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GDL Problem question- fail?

Hi all,

I'm currently on the GDL and recently had to hand in my first piece of coursework- a contract problem question. This had about six or seven different contracts to analyse.

I'm hoping that someone who has already been through the GDL will be able to help me understand how these are marked. Essentially, I messed up my analysis of one of the contracts and misinterpreted it, stating a rule incorrectly in the process. My analysis of the other contracts was fine, although probably not perfect.

What I'd really like to know, as it's frankly left me worried sick, is the extent to which I'll be penalised for messing up one of my analyses. Is one serious error as this enough to have failed?

Thanks- hpsauce

Reply 1

hpsauce

Thanks for the answers. I don't think my issue was with structure so much as with misinterpreting one of the aspects of the contract. I decided that the original offer had been killed when it was actually an option contract. Because I thought negotiations between the parties had concluded, I didn't analyse the next aspect of the contract at all. The mark scheme seems to indicate that I can still pass despite major omissions, which I assume my mistake is.

I suppose I wonder just how serious this is likely to be taken, despite largely stating and applying correct law to the facts of the other contracts. Whilst we were shown example answers from the fail and pass categories, mine doesn't really seem to fit in either. The fail answer was almost entirely irrelevant and littered with errors, whilst the pass answer messed up various aspects in different contracts but didn't screw-up an entire contract like I did.

Does this help at all or change your answer? Does anyone else have any thoughts?

Reply 2

Forum User

Original post by hpsauce

I decided that the original offer had been killed when it was actually an option contract. Because I thought negotiations between the parties had concluded, I didn't analyse the next aspect of the contract at all.

This is very very often an error. Most of the questions will be set on the basis that a large number of 'requirements' are at least arguable and you should set out the legal result based on either of the possible ways a court could interpret it, unless the position is so clear as to be unarguable. For example, if you answer a tort problem question, then the answer is monumentally unlikely to be "There is no duty of care, the claimant loses, the end." Much more likely that there *may* be a duty of care, and then under the assumption that there is, you go on to discuss breach, causation, etc

I don't know what mark you will get but I can't see how you could get many of the marks available for that part of the question if you did not discuss any of the other issues. There's no way the examiner can assume that if you had found an offer existed, you would have gone on to get some of the rest of the question right. In the tort example above, if a candidate threw their pen down in triumph after concluding there was no duty, then the examiner has no idea if they know the first thing about breach, causation, or remoteness, and can't award positive marks for the 'potential knowledge'.

All just guesses of course, I'm not a GDL examiner (or even a GDL student, I'm doing an LL.B.)