SHIPWORKS ENGINEERING PTE LTD v SEMBCORP MARINE INTEGRATED YARD PTE LTD

Facts

Shipworks Engineering Pte Ltd and Lanka Marine Services Pte Ltd supplied works and manpower to Sembcorp Marine Integrated Yard Pte Ltd and Jurong Shipyard Pte Ltd under Work Orders, and sued for payment in four consolidated suits led by Suit No 1040 of 2020. The yard companies counterclaimed. In the main judgment, Shipworks Engineering Pte Ltd and another v Sembcorp Marine Integrated Yard Pte Ltd and another and other suits [2024] SGHC 325, Choo Han Teck J decided liability and directed the parties to calculate the damages each owed the other.

The parties agreed on a large part of the figures; the Work Orders on which they shared a common position came to $6,959,144.76 in the plaintiffs' favour. This judgment resolves the points they could not agree on, using the terminology of the main judgment. A key element was the evidence of the defendants' expert, Ms Lee, who examined signatures on the timesheets supporting the claims.

Issues

1. Whether payment should be excluded for timesheets the defendants said bore faint or illegible signatures
2. Whether the 1% administrative charge applied to partial payments made before 27 July 2018, and which date governs
3. Whether the defendants could rely on their own set of documents to prove the counterclaim in HC/S 1042/2020
4. How disputed hours and payment rates on certain Work Orders should be resolved

Holding

The court resolved the remaining quantum disputes, largely in the plaintiffs' favour on the claims but in the defendants' favour on the principle of the S 1042 counterclaim. It set out its decision on each disputed Work Order and the resulting sums per suit, leaving the counterclaim's 13 disputed Work Orders aside. For those, it directed the parties to agree the sums or, failing agreement, jointly appoint an independent accountant whose figures would be final and binding. Costs were to be heard within 10 days after the final sum was settled.

Reasoning

On the faint timesheets, the judge accepted the plaintiffs' figures. The defendants had never pleaded which timesheets they now called faint, so the plaintiffs had no chance to produce clearer copies. That differed from timesheets Ms Lee had found too faint to examine, where the plaintiffs were on notice and did not respond.

On administrative charges, the main judgment had already held that the defendants proved no agreement for charges on partial payments before 27 July 2018. The relevant date was that of the partial payment invoice or Request for Partial Payment form, whichever was later, not the date of payment. For one Work Order where Ms Lee could not examine signatures, the plaintiffs failed to prove further sums, but the defendants could not recover the $214,000 already paid: their multi-layered checks before payment showed they had been satisfied the claims were in order. For the Non-Invoiced Work, the plaintiffs were limited to the one Work Order valued at $125,896, since the issue was whether the rest was completed, not what it was worth.

On the S 1042 counterclaim, the main judgment's preference for the Plaintiffs' Timesheets concerned the plaintiffs' claims only. The defendants' documents were the only ones before the court on the counterclaim, so where Ms Lee found signatures forged or fabricated, the defendants could recover what they paid, unless other genuinely signed documents covered the same work and hours. The plaintiffs' complaint of obviously wrong timesheets failed because they had not identified any. Differences over hours and rates, amounting to $898,035.48, were matters of arithmetic the parties should resolve themselves.

From the judgment