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Serenity Sdn

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Serenity Sdn. Bhd (Serenity) runs a nursing home providing residential care for old people. Serenity needs new machines for washing the 60 odd residents' bed linen and clothes after their old ones broke down. Miss Voon, the director in charge of the nursing home, calls up Wash R Us Berhad ("Wash R Us"), a retailer of electrical appliances specializing in laundry equipment. She informed the salesman for Wash R Us that the home needs new machines to do their laundry works and asks recommendations about the type of machines to be used. After hearing the explanations, Miss Voon however decided to order five "Laurel" brand Model EZ 580 machines to be delivered to "Serenity Pte Limited. She selected that particular model because she herself owns one in her house and is happy with its performance. The salesman did not comment anything about her choice.

After a month of use, the washing machines start to break down regularly. Serenity complains to Wash R Us. Their reply was that the washing machines are ordinary domestic machines and are not intended to be run almost continuously, with an average of five loads daily, as Serenity is doing. Serenity then consulted Chong, an independent expert on electrical appliances, who confirms that domestic washing machines are designed to cope with only up to three loads a day. What Serenity needed, says Chong, are industrial strength machines. Miss Voon had no idea that washing machines come in different grades and neither do the nine members of her staff. They all think that the big machines they have seen in commercial laundries and nursing homes differ from smaller machines only in the size of the load they can wash.

Meanwhile Miss Voon's assistant, Bong bought a second-hand van from Teddy to be used by Serenity to ferry the old people under their care for their monthly check-up at the hospital. Teddy explained that he was retiring from his own business and had bought the van new several months before. The police have now informed Miss Voon that the van was in fact stolen from Mamat six months ago. The thief who stole the van from Mamat sold it to Teddy, who had no idea that it was stolen. The police consequently seized the van as it is considered as evidence in their case against the thief.

Advise Miss Voon as Serenity Sdn. Bhd directors on Serenity's rights and liabilities concerning the two transactions detailed above (i.e. the washing machines and the van) under the provision of Sale of Goods Act 1957.

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