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a) That's right. The sale of goods legislation was drawn up with commercial sales in mind. Because commercial buyers and sellers are presumed to enjoy equal bargaining power, the policy of the law is to allow them as much freedom as possible to negotiate their own terms. The sale of goods legislation therefore explicitly allows the parties to exclude by agreement the terms that would otherwise be implied by the legislation into a contract. See a list of the relevant sections.

Accordingly, on the facts given in the example, A and B have effectively excluded any implied term that the coats must be of merchantable quality.

Note: Different considerations apply in the case of consumer contracts, because consumers have little or no bargaining power when dealing with suppliers. Except in NSW, the sale of goods legislation does not make special provision for consumer transactions, but the Australian Consumer Law provides special guarantees for consumers. This is explained in the next section.

 

 

 

 

 

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