British Airways vs. Ca

2. British Airways vs.
CA
Facts:
First International Trading and General Services Co., a duly licensed domestic recruitment and
placement agency, received a telex message from its principal ROLACO Engineering and Contracting
Services in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia to recruit Filipino contract workers in behalf of said principal. Said
principal paid to the Jeddah branch of petitioner British Airways, Inc. airfare tickets for 93 contract workers
with specific instruction to transport said workers to Jeddah on or before March 30, 1981. As soon as
petitioner received a prepaid ticket advice from its Jeddah branch to transport the 93 workers, private
respondent was immediately informed by petitioner that its principal had forwarded 93 prepaid tickets.
Thereafter, private respondent instructed its travel agent, ADB Travel and Tours. Inc., to book the 93
workers with petitioner but the latter failed to fly said workers, thereby compelling private respondent to
borrow money in the amount of P304,416. Sometime in the first week of June, 1981, private respondent
was again informed by the petitioner that it had received a prepaid ticket advice from its Jeddah branch
for the transportation contract workers. private respondent instructed its travel agent to book the 27
contract workers with the petitioner but the latter was only able to book and confirm 16 seats on its June
9, 1981 flight. However, on the date of the scheduled flight only 9 workers were able to board said flight
while the remaining 7 workers were rebooked to June 30, 1981 which bookings were again cancelled by
the petitioner without any prior notice to either private respondent or the workers. Similar incidents
happened between the petitioner and respondent wherein the petitioner, repeatedly failed to transport
respondent’s contract workers despite confirmed bookings and payment of the corresponding travel
taxes.
Petitioner contended that private respondent has no cause of action against it there being no
perfected contract of carriage existing between them as no ticket was ever issued to private respondent's
contract workers and, therefore, the obligation of the petitioner to transport said contract workers did not
arise. Furthermore, private respondent's failure to attach any ticket in the complaint further proved that it
was never a party to the alleged transaction.
Issue:
Whether or not private respondent has a cause of action against petitioner?
Ruling:
Private respondent had a valid cause of action for damages against petitioner. A cause of action
is an act or omission of one party in violation of the legal right or rights of the other.9 Petitioner's repeated
failures to transport private respondent's workers in its flight despite confirmed booking of said workers
clearly constitutes breach of contract and bad faith on its part. In resolving petitioner's theory that private
respondent has no cause of action in the instant case, the appellate court correctly held that:
In dealing with the contract of common carriage of passengers for purpose of accuracy, there are two (2)
aspects of the same, namely: (a) the contract "to carry (at some future time)," which contract is
consensual and is necessarily perfected by mere consent and (b) the contract "of carriage" or "of common
carriage" itself which should be considered as a real contract for not until the carrier is actually used can
the carrier be said to have already assumed the obligation of a carrier. (In the instant case, the contract
"to carry" is the one involved which is consensual and is perfected by the mere consent of the parties.
There is no dispute as to the appellee's consent to the said contract "to carry" its contract workers
from Manila to Jeddah. The appellant's consent thereto, on the other hand, was manifested by its
acceptance of the PTA or prepaid ticket advice that ROLACO Engineering has prepaid the airfares of the
appellee's contract workers advising the appellant that it must transport the contract workers on or before
the end of March, 1981 and the other batch in June, 1981.Even if a PTA is merely an advice from the
sponsors that an airline is authorized to issue a ticket and thus no ticket was yet issued, the fact remains
that the passage had already been paid for by the principal of the appellee, and the appellant had
accepted such payment. The existence of this payment was never objected to nor questioned by the
appellant in the lower court. Thus, the cause or consideration which is the fare paid for the passengers
exists in this case.
The third essential requisite of a contract is an object certain. In this contract "to carry", such an
object is the transport of the passengers from the place of departure to the place of destination as stated
in the telex.
Accordingly, there could be no more pretensions as to the existence of an oral contract of
carriage imposing reciprocal obligations on both parties.In the case of appellee, it has fully complied with
the obligation, namely, the payment of the fare and its willingness for its contract workers to leave for their
place of destination.
On the other hand, the facts clearly show that appellant was remiss in its obligation to transport
the contract workers on their flight despite confirmation and bookings made by appellee's travelling agent.
While there is no dispute that ROLACO Engineering advanced the payment for the airfares of the
appellee's contract workers who were recruited for ROLACO Engineering and the said contract workers
were the intended passengers in the aircraft of the appellant, the said contract "to carry" also involved the
appellee for as recruiter he had to see to it that the contract workers should be transported to ROLACO
Engineering in Jeddah thru the appellant's transportation. For that matter, the involvement of the appellee
in the said contract "to carry" was well demonstrated when the appellant upon receiving the PTA
immediately advised the appellee thereof.

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