cancel transaction, Smythe v Thomas case is outdated??

[packnland_sale]

I reckon some of you know this story, Smythe v Thomas case, in Australia below.

1. A plane was listed on eBay auction in 2006.

2. The saler found a potential buyer who offered a good deal outside of eBay and decided to sell it to him.

3. However, someone also won the auction at the lower price than that then sued the saler.

4. The court judged that the saler had to sell the plane to the winner of the auction as the sales contract had been formed accoding to eBay agreement at that time.

My question is, if this occres now, the saler wouldn't have to sale the plane because eBay allows sallers to cancel transaction in their favor as below?

https://www.ebay.com.au/help/selling/getting-paid/cancelling-transaction?id=4136

I think we used to need the resolution center to make mutual cancel agreement between saler and buyer, right? When this is gone?

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Archive-Selling/How-do-you-cancel-a-sale-by-mutual-agreement/td-p/1863...

[padi*0409 · Accepted solution]

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@packnland_sale wrote:

My question is, if this occurs now, the seller wouldn't have to sell the plane because eBay allows sellers to cancel transaction in their favor as below?

https://www.ebay.com.au/help/selling/getting-paid/cancelling-transaction?id=4136

(misspellings corrected)

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Despite what that policy says, unless the buyer was to take the case to court - and that's unlikely to happen unless the "sale" is up around $150,000 and the buyer can afford to go through that court process - we'll never know how a judge is likely to rule on it.

This link to the case ruling in 2007, which may or may not be relevant now :-

http://www5.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/ANZCompuLawJl/2007/14.pdf