Commercial Disputes Weekly Issue 290 30 June 2026

MARITIME

A contract for the sale of a ship on an amended Saleform 2012 provided for payment by release from escrow within three banking days of notice of readiness. The escrow account was held by a Norwegian bank and the three days was due to expire on 8 September 2026. Payment was not made by midnight on 8 September in Norway and the sellers almost immediately gave notice to cancel. The buyers asserted that they were not in default. A tribunal agreed and held that sellers’ notice was too early. Sellers successfully challenged that conclusion under section 69 Arbitration Act 1996. The definition of banking days in the contract defined it as the days banks were open in certain listed locations. The court held that this simply identified which days were relevant in counting the time period, not that the time only expired at the end of the day in the latest of those locations. The time expired at midnight in the place where the obligation to release the deposit was to be performed, therefore Norway. The sellers’ notice to cancel was valid.

Songa Product and Chemical Tankers IV AS v Gardsea Shipping Inc [2026] EWHC 1559 (Comm), 23 June 2026

STATE IMMUNITY

The Court of Appeal has confirmed that the provision in the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards in which each contracting state confirms that it shall recognise and enforce binding arbitration awards is not a submission to the adjudicative jurisdiction of the English courts. It does not waive any sovereign immunity that the state may be able to assert. The relevant provision says that awards will be enforced “in accordance with the rules of procedure of the territory where the award is relied upon”. Sovereign immunity is a rule of procedure and so can be applied as part of the enforcement process.

CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd and others v Republic of India [2026] EWCA Civ 797, 24 June 2026

CONSTRUCTION

The claimant consultant was engaged to provide engineering consultancy services for the defendant in relation to a development. The claimant sought payment of a sum of £910,501.71 after the defendant allegedly failed to serve timely pay less notices. The Technology and Construction Court upheld the claim. The contract did not comply with s. 110 of the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 in relation to the final date for payment because it provided that the final date could vary, when it needed to be fixed. As a result, the default provisions in the Act replaced the contract terms. The defendant’s pay less notices were out of time as they were required to be not less than five days before the final date for payment (which was 17 days after the due date).

Deerns UK Ltd v VDC LHR11 Ltd [2026] EWHC 1509 (TCC), 23 June 2026

AGENCY

In a dispute arising from a hotel development project that was subsequently abandoned, the court has considered an application for directors to hand over their phones for the purposes of disclosure. The claimant Lloyds Development Limited is in administration and sought the phones of two of its directors. The court allowed the application and ordered that the directors hand their devices over to an independent reviewer. It held that Lloyds had a common law right to inspect the phones as the directors were Lloyds’ agents and had used their phones to communicate about the principal’s affairs. The directors had chosen to use their personal phones for company matters and must accept the consequences. Further, any concerns about privacy and confidentiality were dealt with by having appointed an independent reviewer. There was also a contractual right to access the phones and it was appropriate to enforce such right with injunctive relief.

Lloyds Development Ltd v Accor Hotel Services UK Ltd [2026] EWHC 1522 (TCC), 19 June 2026