Case report

Reasonable endeavours in Force majeure case explained. The Supreme Court in RTI Ltd V MUR Shipping BV [2024] UKSC 18 tried to strike a balance between contractual certainty and uncommercial outcomes finding for MUR in the last saga of this widely reported Force Majeure dispute concerning whether a party was obliged to accept a payment in EUR due to sanctions restrictions, an uncontractual currency. The court found that clear words were needed to forgo valuable rights so unless expressly stated (and the parties should consider amend their Force Majeure clauses), there is no requirement to accept a non contractual performance despite reasonable endeavours language to overcome the effects of a force majeure event.

The only endeavours that may be reasonable are those that could alter the event or state of affairs that caused the force majeure but the parties are free to strike a different bargain!