Court order and defiance

[KARL]

I am in a protracted dispute with a rip-off-artist trader. Most recently I raised a small claim against him in his local court, a case which he lost. The claim addressed only one of the elements of the dispute, which by now centres on returning items of property to me, and he has sent me a cheque to meet the court's finding regarding his duty to pay me for stated items he has not returned and no longer has. I am not cashing the cheque because he attached a condition saying that doing so would constitute acceptance that the payment covers all sums due from him. This is his second attempt, previously he demanded a written acceptance that all disputes were concluded before sending a cheque - I insisted he should pay the sum. How would you take this from here � remembering that I intend to press for what was outside the small claim and in the process raise as many small claims as necessary to get redress for any non-returns ? Obviously, subsequent items/cases will be separate from the present matter.

[Buenchico]

Cash the cheque and advise the person who wrote it that, by doing so, you have not entered into any contract obliging you not to take further action against him. Further advise him that he cannot impose such a contract on you, as to attempt to do so would be trying to seek 'evasion by means of a secondary contract', as defined by the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977, which invalidates any such contract terms.

Chris