Dear Colleagues;
There is an interesting discussion of unjust enrichment, change of position and estoppel in the decision of a single judge in Victoria in TRA Global Pty Ltd v Kebakoska [2011] VSC 480 (27 September 2011) http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/vic/VSC/2011/480.html. Employee dismissed with a redundancy payment which turns out to have been wrongly calculated and more than she was entitled to; having disclosed this to the social security body she was unable to get unemployment benefits and hence had to live off the payment until finding a new job. Was the firm entitled to a refund of the overpayment? Had she changed her position so that she did not have to repay all, or any, of the amount? Did the doctrine of estoppel apply so that the company in any event could not go back on its representation that this was what she was entitled to? In the end she retained the full amount because the answer to the last question was, yes. But there is some discussion of the other questions.
Regards
Neil


Neil Foster
Senior Lecturer
Newcastle Law School
Faculty of Business & Law
University of Newcastle
Callaghan NSW 2308
AUSTRALIA
ph 02 4921 7430
fax 02 4921 6931

http://www.newcastle.edu.au/staff/profile/neil.foster.html

http://works.bepress.com/neil_foster/

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