Q: A distributor of construction supplies sold something to a contractor, who then hired a worker to install it in the house of a customer. After driving long-distance to the customer’s house, and investing an extensive amount of time, the worker did not manage to install it, because it turned out to be defective. All of the parties involved — including the manufacturer of the faulty item — are Jewish.
The following she’eilos were posed regarding this case: Is the worker entitled to full payment despite his inability to install the item? If he is entitled to payment, who bears responsibility — the contractor who hired him, or the distributor, who sold the defective item, or the manufacturer, who made and sold the faulty item?
A: Several cases discussed in halachah offer background necessary to answer these she’eilos.
1) Worker Hired but Item Not Present
If an employer hired a worker to transport something from one place to another, but when he reached the first location, the item was not there, the employer must pay him in full (Shulchan Aruch, Choshen Mishpat 335:2). Since the worker did what he was hired to do, the fact that his employer did not benefit from his work is irrelevant (Nesivos ibid.).
2) Sale of Defective Seeds
A person who sold seeds for cultivation, and it turned out that they were incapable of growing anything, the seller is obligated to return the buyer’s money, because it is considered a mekach ta’us (ibid. 232:20). Even if the seller, too, was cheated by the person who sold them to him, he must still refund the money to his buyer (Sma ibid. 46; see Shulchan Aruch ibid. 18).
If the buyer wants to be reimbursed for expenses he incurred — e.g., he paid a gardener to plant the seeds — if the seller did not know that the seeds were defective, he is certainly not obligated to reimburse the buyer (Choshen Mishpat 232:21). Even if we consider this a case of gerama (causation), and assume that rises to the level of garmi (direct causation), a person is not liable for garmi he committed inadvertently (Shach 386:6).
If the seller knew that the seeds would not grow, the Rishonim and poskim debate whether this is garmi, in which case beis din can obligate him to pay (as the Shulchan Aruch rules in 232:21), or if he is not liable in beis din (dinei adam) because this is only a gerama since the buyer is the one who decided to hire a gardener — even if he did so based on the false pretenses presented by the seller — and gerama cannot be enforced by beis din (see Mishpat Shalom ibid and Imrei Binah, Dayanim 21). But the seller is obligated to pay latzeis yedei Shamayim (to avert Heavenly judgment).
In our case, since the distributor had no idea that the item was defective, he is not liable for the amount the contractor paid his worker.
Regarding whether the manufacturer must cover expenses incurred by the buyer of a faulty item, it would seem to depend on the halachos outlined above: If he did not know that the item was defective, then he is not liable. If he did know, then it is subject to the aforementioned dispute as to whether beis din can hold him liable or he is obligated to pay only latzeis yedei Shamayim.
Some poskim suggest that the manufacturer might be liable due to the halachah that a person who shows currency to a moneychanger to ascertain whether it is valid and he can accept it from a customer, and the moneychanger didn’t check it carefully and caused a financial loss to the person who asked him, he must compensate him for that loss (Choshen Mishpat 306:6). Similarly, since manufacturers generally have a quality control department, a buyer purchases from the company under the assurance of that department that the item is not defective. If it turns out to be defective, the company should be liable for the expenses he incurred trying to install it (see Mishpat Hamazik 18, fn. 64).
But this is not a valid comparison, because in our case, the customer did not have direct contact with the manufacturer, so he can’t claim that the manufacturer personally recommended that he use the item (as did the moneychanger). Furthermore, the purpose of quality control is to save the manufacturer the headache of dealing with loads of returns or face losing his reputation, not to take on the burden of compensating a customer who happened to buy a defective model and incurred expenses trying to get it installed before realizing that it was defective.
