Legal Question in Business Law in California

Re: Failure to perform in a timely manner

Timeliness of performance is a frequent and major problem in contracts for services. Architects use standard form agreements most of the time, and they have preprinted provisions for completion of various stages of work (with blanks to be filled in), as I remember. I don't know what licensed home designers use for contract forms; they probably don't use the AIA contracts, but likely have similar forms.

All this is to say that since you signed a contract, which was probably an industry-wide form, it would be mildly surprising to me if it failed to contain written provisions, and blanks that should be filled in, relating to when the plans needed to be ready and what would happen if they weren't. So, before focusing too much on the oral promise, you should review the written contract for all the time-of-performance clauses.

Among the things I'd look for are clauses that relate to what would happen if YOU were late in doing something, like paying your bill or specifying some feature or approving the result. If there are tight deadlines, I'd consider that evidence that the parties intended time to be of the essence.

If the written contract lacks specific deadlines or even general concepts of timeliness, courts generally will read in an implied promise to deliver the results "within a reasonable time." What's reasonable? That would be up to the common sense of a jury (if there were a jury trial). Maybe three weeks or even four is not an unreasonable delay, but, let's say the project is to build a school building. The judge or jury would assume that reasonableness is to have it done before the school year starts. Work on a stadium needs to be done before the season opener. Similarly, missing a whole season because of no plans before frost season could easily be held an unreasonable delay.

Bring in a position to win in court if there were a lawsuit doesn't mean you should sue, however; you should negotiate for either an immediate delivery or an immediate rescission of the contract while you can still find and use someone else.