Harrison v Beizer

[*1] Harrison v Beizer 2015 NY Slip Op 50766(U) Decided on May 6, 2015 Appellate Term, Second Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the printed Official Reports.

Decided on May 6, 2015
SUPREME COURT, APPELLATE TERM, SECOND DEPARTMENT, 2d, 11th and 13th JUDICIAL DISTRICTS
PRESENT: : PESCE, P.J., SOLOMON and ELLIOT, JJ.
2013-2614 Q C

Marichal L. Harrison, Respondent,

against

Harriet Beizer, Appellant.

Appeal from a judgment of the Civil Court of the City of New York, Queens County (Carmen R. Velasquez, J.), entered March 19, 2013. The judgment, after a nonjury trial, awarded plaintiff the principal sum of $600.

ORDERED that the judgment is reversed, without costs, and the matter is remitted to the Civil Court for the entry of a judgment dismissing the action.

Plaintiff commenced this small claims action to recover for unpaid court reporting services. It is undisputed that defendant owns a court reporting service and that her office reached out to plaintiff to offer her a job transcribing a deposition. At a nonjury trial, defendant argued that, while it offered plaintiff the job, it did so on behalf of another court reporting agency, Global Depositions Court Reporters (Global), and that, as a disclosed agent for Global, defendant was not liable for plaintiff's unpaid wages. Following the nonjury trial, the Civil Court found that it was defendant who had hired plaintiff and awarded judgment in plaintiff's favor in the principal sum of $600.

Upon a review of the record, we find that the judgment did not render substantial justice according to the rules and principles of substantive law (CCA 1804, 1807). An agent who enters into a contract on behalf of a disclosed principal will generally not be liable for a breach of that contract (see Stonhard v Blue Ridge Farms, LLC, 114 AD3d 757 [2014]; Matter of Anderson v PODS, Inc., 70 AD3d 820 [2010]; see also Rothschild Sunsystems v Pawlus, 129 AD2d 933 [1987]). For an agency relationship to be effectively disclosed so as to absolve the agent from liability under a contract, "such disclosure must occur at the time the contract is made" (Ardwin v Englert, 81 AD2d 960, 961 [1981], affd 56 NY2d 936 [1982]). Here, defendant's manager testified that, while she had sent plaintiff an email from defendant's office offering plaintiff this specific court reporting job, it had been made clear to plaintiff that she would be working for Global. Significantly, the evidence demonstrated that plaintiff had announced at the deposition that she was "from Global." Inasmuch as defendant's agency relationship with Global had been disclosed to plaintiff at the time the contract was made, defendant is not liable to plaintiff. Accordingly, the judgment is reversed and the matter is remitted to the Civil Court for the entry of a judgment dismissing the action.

Pesce, P.J., Solomon and Elliot, JJ., concur.

Decision Date: May 06, 2015