Contract law in Lithuania. General provisions

ECOVIS Miškinis, Kvainauskas ir partneriai advokatų kontora

(continued from last next issue)

Each party of a contract is obliged to act in accordance with good faith in their contractual relationships. The following elements shall be sufficient to render a contract valid: an agreement of legally capable parties and, when prescribed by laws, also a form of a contract. Contracts may be unilateral and bilateral, onerous and gratuitous, consensual and real, contracts of successive performance and of instantaneous performance, consumer contracts and others.

According to the manner of their conclusion, contracts are divided into contracts by mutual agreement and contracts of adhesion. According to the definiteness of advantages that the parties obtain, contracts are divided into aleatory (where receiving of advantages and the amount of the obligation of the parties is uncertain and dependant on occurrence or non-occurrence of a certain event) and commutative contracts (where the advantages and the extent of the advantages obtained by the parties are certain and determinate at the time when the contract is formed).

Separately defined, a public contract is a contract concluded by a legal person (businesspeople) that renders services or sells goods to an indefinite number of persons, i.e. to everyone who makes a request (enterprises of transport, communications, electricity, heating, gas, water supply and others). In rendering services or selling goods, any legal person shall be bound to enter into contracts with every person who applies for those services, with the exception of cases approved in accordance with the procedure established by laws.

When concluding public contracts, a legal person may not privilege one or another person, except in cases provided for by the law. Prices and other conditions of goods and services under public contracts must be equal to all consumers of the same category, except in cases expressly provided for by laws where preferential conditions may be applied to the separate categories of consumers.

These are the general provisions of Lithuanian contract law. The best way to ensure the proper representation of the rights concluding the particular contract is to consult a lawyer.