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Comment by brandonbloom | Hacker News Reader

    I fully intend to walk into the office, hand them
    the key, and point out that I never signed the
    document and will fight any attempts to charge me
    the next three months worth of rent.

I hate to break it to you, but that contract is enforceable. Pretending for a moment that this is something that would ever make it to court, you would be found in breach.

In reality, what will happen is this: You'll refuse to pay. They'll casually send your account to collections. You'll get some phone calls from a collection agency and it will hurt your credit report. Ultimately, you'll pay them to protect your credit score.

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I hate to break it to you Brandon, but you're wrong. He never signed the contract requiring 90 days notice. In fact, he didn't sign any contract, so only the most minimal terms are part of the de facto contract that exists between the OP and the storage facility. Generally, that means the right to store stuff for a month, renewed each month at the option of the renter. This is basic contract law in America, especially as it applies between businesses and consumers.

Also--what you've suggested regarding collections is illegal. Ultimately, the storage facility would end up paying the OP significant damages and legal fees--after paying to clean up any economic harm they cause to his credit, and any economic harm he suffered as a result of such credit score damage.

Presumably if this did go to court he would just tell the court he had neither seen nor signed any contract, and dare them to forge one, which they might do if they had any examples of his signature.

I can't get over the 90 days notice thing. For storage, that is ridiculous. It's not like they're going to start running ads in the paper for "Unit J-14, a 5x8 walkup". I've rented numerous storage units in numerous states, and I've never been charged more than the last complete month. (So OK, maybe I've been screwed out of 29 days, but I understand they don't want to mess with billing cycles or proration.) Also, I've never gone into a storage place and found any size I wanted unavailable. These places don't want to leave money on the table, so if they start filling up they either raise prices or build more units. If you never fill up, 90 days notice is ridiculous.

> he would just tell the court he had neither seen nor signed any contract

If he claimed he didn't see the contract, he would be committing perjury. They wouldn't bother to forge his signature because even if both parties legitimately forget the story about the fax machine, the court would likely still find the contract enforceable.

At absolute minimum, they'd have an oral contract. However, that oral contract is probably "You pay, and we'll both abide by the terms of my standard contract."

Now, that's not to say that the court will find the 90 day clause enforceable. The court may decide to enforce the contract as limited by industry norms, which may be 30 days. I don't know, but he certainly won't get away with paying nothing.

I should probably add, IANAL, but I'm also not just making this shit up.

I should've been a bit more specific. I fully expect to pay for the last month (and I'm okay with that). The 90 day thing is a bit too much though, IMO.

> I hate to break it to you, but that contract is enforceable.

Please explain. How can they enforce a contract he never signed?

Contracts don't require signatures. Verbal contracts are enforceable outside of certain odd cases (for instance buying a house). They mainly get signatures to exactly qualify what was agreed and to make sure you don't claim you didn't agree.

I am not sure if this would fall under rental law, which I would assume requires a signature.

But he/she never specified they verbally agreed. In fact it seems that he/she made it pretty clear to the lesser that they didn't know if they agreed.

Payment in this case constitutes agreement.

Agreement to hire, yes. But agreement to anything which might be in the contract not necessarily. This is beyond my legal knowledge.

If he had not read the agreement it would be difficult to hold him to it, however once he had read it continued payments are him affirming the contents of the contract.

Now whether it is worth the effort to fight his logic is another matter entirely.

Perhaps because he carefully read the contract, provided payment knowing the contract terms, specifically conspired to violate said terms, and then posted the whole story to the internet might qualify? There's a concept of "good faith" in the law. This is just vile, sorry. If you don't like the terms you have an obligation not to buy the service.

I wasn't aware of the 90-day policy until after I had already bought the service, FWIW.

Wouldn't the right thing to do be this: Go back the next day and say that you don't accept these terms and demand a refund of any payment made?

I would assume that the continued use of said storage unit makes acceptance of contract implicit.

If you'd taken the contract home and _not_ read it, you would probably be more in the clear. Since you read it and knew about the 90 day rule and continued to pay, it could be argued that you had an agreement. This is why we sign contracts instead of other forms of agreements; there is less ambiguity.

Good luck to you, sir.

Uh...no. He agreed to pay $X a month to storage goods at the facility. He never agreed to the rest of the terms, which he would have indicated by signing the contract. The business indicated assent by not requiring him to sign the contract to receive his storage unit. Thus, under the basic principles of U.S. contract law...a very basic contract exists, and none of the extra stuff in the written document is part of it.

Buying the service doesn't legally enter him into the additional contract.

Signing the contract does that, and that's why he was asked (half-assedly) to do that. If anyone is liable for damages due to failing to properly conduct the company's business, it's our Facebook surfing friend at the counter.

That's entirely backwards, sorry. A "contract" is just an agreement. The signature is just a piece of paper that can prove the agreement was reached. Courts enforce "implied" and "verbal" contracts all the time, and in fact signed contracts are routinely voided for technical reasons too.

The poster above read and understood the contract, and continued to pay the vendor with that understanding in mind. That is absolutely a legally enforceable contract. And in fact the post above is blindingly obvious proof of a bad faith intent to violate the contract. Sorry, there's no leg to stand on here. That's just not the way the law works.

I wouldn't be surprised that Facebook guy behind the counter was stupid enough to forge the signature.

For his sake I hope not. If he did he could end up in prison if this was brought to trial (if a first tim eoffender he would probably just get a fine). Forging signatures is really bad, never do it.

Unless you're one of the asshats at Prenda Law:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/05/identity-theft-la...

Debt collectors in the UK do this as a matter of course. If you ever get one on your case, your solicitor will suggest that you print your name or write an X rather than use your signature or it'll come up on another document agreeing to piles of additional charges later on.

If he didn't sign it, then he didn't agree to the 90 day clause. If they charged him, then he has the right to use the space for a month - no more, no less. But, they could lock him out at the end of the month and not auto renew the 30 day lease.

Contracts exist to protect both parties.

Now, that being said - this would be a small claims issue and it probably isn't worth dealing with for $120.

Wouldn't using the service knowing that you don't have a contract be fraud?

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