While Florida encourages a competitive market for their businesses to offer a great experience for their consumers, sometimes competitive behavior can go too far. When one party interferes with the relationships or contracts of another party with the sole intent of causing them financial harm, it’s referred to as tortious interference.
The most common tortious interference
The most common type of tortious interference is when a party induces or forces a party to breach a contract that they had with a third party. This can be done in many different ways, such as blackmail, threat or even offering the party below market prices. Another common type of tortious interference is when a person intentionally interferes with a developing or full-blown business relationship with the intent of harming the third party.
Proving tortious interference
In all cases, the party accused of interference must act with intention. Acting with negligence is not enough to prove the plaintiff’s case. In addition to acting with intent, the defendant must also have a clear form of improper motivation. This motivation may be something like trying to ruin a relationship of one party with another business so that the defendant can step in and sell their items to the breaching party. In this case, there will be clear motivation for the accused to interfere with the existing business relationship.
When these types of tortious interference acts occur, the accused party can be sued by one or both of the other parties involved. These include the party that was induced or forced to violate a business contract or relationship and the party to which the contract or relationship was bound to.
Tortious interference is something that every business owner should be aware of. Laws surrounding the subject help to keep competition fair for all parties involved. If you believe that you’ve experienced a tortious interference with your business or relationship, it’s a good idea to speak to a lawyer about formulating a case to receive compensation.
