GASL Ireland Leasing A-1 Limited v SpiceJet Limited

A claimant seeking judgment at a hearing which the defendant does not attend must still present the case fairly and draw material points potentially assisting the defendant to the court’s attention. The court must independently scrutinise the evidence.

A contractual clause making the lessor’s certificate of amounts payable conclusive and binding absent manifest error may apply to indemnity sums as well as debt claims. Selecting one figure within a reasonable evidential range does not ordinarily constitute manifest error.

The claimant, the lessor under an English-law aircraft lease, claimed sums arising from the defendant lessee’s failure to pay rent and to redeliver an aircraft in the contractually required condition. The rent claim had already been determined by summary judgment in the sum of US$5,334,121.25.

The defendant’s legal representatives came off the record for non-payment of fees. The defendant applied to adjourn the trial and did not participate after that application was refused. The claimant applied to amend its pleaded case. The issues concerned breach of the redelivery conditions, the reasonable costs of remedying those breaches, maintenance-payment adjustments, recovery costs, and the effect of the lease’s certification clause.

1. The adjournment application was refused and permission to amend was granted. The defendant had provided no factual or expert evidence, had repeatedly delayed the proceedings, and had offered no reliable basis for believing that an adjournment would enable it to prepare. The prejudice to the claimant, wasted costs and disruption to court users outweighed the defendant’s asserted need for further time.

2. Although the defendant did not attend trial, the claimant remained subject to a duty of fair presentation. Following Braspetro Oil Services v FPSO Construction Inc [2007] EWHC 1359 (Comm) and CMOC Sales & Marketing Limited v Person Unknown [2018] EWHC 2230 (Comm), the court scrutinised the claimant’s evidence and required it to address points which might assist the defendant.

3. The lease’s redelivery conditions were contractual requirements. The evidence established breaches concerning the engines, APU, inspections, airworthiness equipment, maintenance, cabin condition and painting. The loss was constituted by the aircraft’s defective condition and could be quantified by the reasonable cost of repair whether or not the work had actually been carried out.

4. Clause 8.7 applied to amounts payable under the indemnity provisions as well as debt claims. A certificate or determination was conclusive and binding absent manifest error. Where the evidence supported a range of reasonable costs, choosing one figure within that range did not amount to manifest error.

5. Judgment was entered for the claimant in the certified sum of US$8,490,312.39, together with interest and costs.