Asked on May 02nd, 2012 on Business Law - North Carolina
More details to this question:
I own a company that sells Fire Equipment in NC. One of the product lines has protected territories in my state that we currently have 1/2 of. At a trade show toward the end of last year I negotiated with the President of the Company here in the US to take the rest of the state from the current dealer of that territory. He said that if I invested in additional products, that he would eliminate that dealer and assign that to us, we shook hands and that was that. I made the purchase in October of last year, but he has yet to turn the rest of the territory over to us. I have asked him many times and he keeps saying he is going to make it happen. I spoke with him two weeks ago and he said he was going to eliminate them the following Monday, never happened. Do I have a leg to stand on legally since it was a oral agreement?
Oral agreements are enforceable, if they can be proven, with certain exceptions not relevant to this situation. The problem you might have is that you cannot afford to get into a dispute with this vendor, because your existing contract presumably doesn't run forever. You should review the situation with your attorney.
Consumers can use this platform to pose legal questions to real lawyers and receive free insights.
Participating legal professionals get the opportunity to speak directly with people who may need their services, as well as enhance their standing in the Lawyers.com community.