Vanquis Bank Limited v TMS Legal Limited

The tort of causing loss by unlawful means is not confined to competition disputes or labour disputes. Its essential elements are unlawful acts actionable by a third party, interference with that third party’s freedom to deal with the claimant, an intention to cause loss, and loss caused by the interference.

At the strike-out or summary-judgment stage, a claimant’s pleaded case is considered at its reasonable pinnacle, with disputed evidence generally resolved in its favour. A regulatory regime does not itself exclude a private-law remedy where the pleaded facts may fall within established tortious principles. Causing customers to bring complaints, followed by a lender’s standard or required suspension of credit, was sufficiently arguable as interference. The applications were dismissed.

Vanquis Bank alleged that TMS Legal had submitted large numbers of irresponsible-lending complaints on behalf of customers without adequate investigation, authority or information. It pleaded breaches of contractual and fiduciary duties, deceit and related unlawful acts, alleging that TMS’s conduct interfered with Vanquis’s relationships with its customers and caused staffing costs, management time, Financial Ombudsman Service fees and lost profits.

TMS applied to strike out the claim under CPR r. 3.4(2)(a) and (c), alternatively for summary judgment under Part 24. The central issue was whether the pleaded facts could fall within the established tort of causing loss by unlawful means, particularly the requirements of unlawful acts, interference, intention and causation.

1. Applications dismissed. The claim was not liable to be struck out under CPR r. 3.4(2)(a) or (c), and TMS was not entitled to summary judgment under Part 24.
2. At this stage, the pleaded case was to be considered at its reasonable pinnacle. Issues of law could be resolved, but disputed evidence was to be assumed in Vanquis’s favour unless TMS’s contrary proposition was unanswerable.
3. The tort contains four elements: unlawful acts used against, and independently actionable by, a third party; interference with the third party’s actions in which the claimant has an economic interest; an intention to cause loss to the claimant by the unlawful means; and loss in fact caused to the claimant.
4. The tort is not restricted to direct competition or labour disputes. Those are paradigm examples, not defining categories. The existence of regulatory or disciplinary mechanisms did not preclude a private-law claim, particularly where they offered no compensatory remedy to Vanquis.
5. Breaches of contractual or fiduciary duties, and deceit, were capable on the pleaded case of supplying unlawful means. Regulatory obligations were not independently actionable, but could inform the content of actionable contractual duties.
6. The interference case was sufficiently arguable. Causing present or former customers to lodge serious complaints could interfere with the bank-customer relationship. Where a lender’s standard practice, or regulatory obligations as applied in practice, led to credit suspension, the pleaded causal chain was also tenable. Evidence of banking custom and practice could include expert evidence.
7. The intention requirement demanded a high degree of blameworthiness. Loss could be intended as a means to an end, and could be inferred where TMS knew that loss was a virtually certain consequence of its business model. This was distinct from merely foreseeing possible loss.
8. The pleaded heads of loss were potentially recoverable. Their existence and amount required factual and financial evidence at trial and could not be resolved summarily.

Vanquis was given 14 days from the order to finalise its proposed Amended Particulars of Claim. Further case-management and costs matters were to be addressed in writing.