The doctrine applies where performance remains possible but the event has substantially frustrated the principal purpose both parties understood. The frustration must be substantially total and the event unforeseen.
It differs from impossibility, where performance itself cannot occur.
Alternative Names:
Commercial Frustration|Frustrated Purpose
Why it Matters?
The requirement that the frustrated purpose be shared and known to both parties defeats most claims, since a party's private commercial motivation is not the contract's purpose. Establishing that the counterparty understood and contracted around that purpose is the analytical burden. Partial frustration also fails, and a substantially reduced but continuing benefit does not excuse performance regardless of how uneconomic it has become.
Frequently Confused with
Related terms
Frequently asked questions
Whose purpose must be frustrated?
Does partial frustration suffice?
