The High Court has refused Linked Recoveries Limited’s application for summary judgment against Paul Dunne over a personal guarantee linked to a business loan, finding that questions about whether the guarantee had been transferred to the company required a full hearing.
Mr Justice Mícheál P. O’Higgins said he was not satisfied it was “very clear” that Mr Dunne had no defence. He stressed that he was not deciding the legal issues raised by the documents, and declined the application under the summary judgment procedure.
The claim sought €87,103.53, said to be due under a guarantee Mr Dunne signed in October 2018 after Linked P2P Limited, trading as Linked Finance, issued a €104,000 loan to Digital Skills Enablement Services Limited. The judgment says €100,235 was advanced after fees, with repayment over 24 months. The borrower later defaulted.
Mr Dunne, representing himself, raised several objections to the loan and guarantee documents, including their electronic signatures, the absence of a witness to his signature, and whether consumer distance-marketing rules applied. The court did not determine those issues.
Instead, the judge allowed Mr Dunne to rely on an additional point raised by the court: whether Linked Recoveries had established that the benefit of the guarantee was assigned or transferred to it. The company’s counsel said there was no separate deed of assignment, but argued that the loan contract automatically transferred to Linked Recoveries when the borrower defaulted.
The judge identified potential difficulties with that argument. The loan agreement and guarantee could be viewed as separate instruments involving different parties. The documents’ definitions of “Loan Contract” focused on the agreement between lenders and borrower, and the assignment provisions referred to the loan and to lenders and borrower without expressly referring to the guarantor or guarantee. The judgment also noted inconsistent use of terms such as “Loan”, “Loan Contract” and “Loan Agreement”.
The judge said those points were arguable and needed to be explored at a full hearing. He did not find that the assignment had failed, or decide whether the guarantee was ultimately enforceable. Because the summary judgment motion was refused on the assignment issue, he found it unnecessary to address Mr Dunne’s other, more technical objections.