58 THE LAW AFFECTING ENGINEERS 



be a disastrous undertaking. With the employer, however, 

 the relations of the architect or engineer are very different. 

 He is the servant of the employer, and can be held liable for 

 negligence which involves his master in any loss. The leading 

 case on this subject is Rogers v. James, 1891, 2 H. B. C., 185. 

 There an architect was employed to design and superintend 

 the erection of a house, and by the terms of the contract with 

 the builder, his decision in all matters between the builder and 

 the building-owner was to be final. Having given his final 

 certificate, the architect sued the builder-owner for his fees. 

 By way of counter-claim, it was alleged that the architect had 

 been guilty of negligence in supervision which led to defects in 

 the work, and damages were sought on this head. To this 

 the architect replied that in granting his final certificate he 

 had taken the defects in question into account, and that the 

 certificate was final. It was held that the final certificate was 

 only final in a dispute between the building-owner and the 

 builder, and not as between the building-owner and the architect, 

 and that the building-owner was entitled to recover damages 

 for negligence in supervision, in spite of the certificate. 



To the rule that the contractor may not sue the architect 

 there appears to be only one exception namely, that if the 

 contractor is paying for the calculation of quantities, the 

 architect may be sued for negligence if those quantities are 

 not reasonably correct. The following case (Bolt v. Thomas), 

 which is referred to in Beven on Negligence, p. 1370, 

 illustrates this proposition. 



The plaintiff sued the defendant, an architect, to recover 

 damages for supplying to the plaintiff an inaccurate statement 

 of the quantities of work and materials required for the 

 erection of a building which the plaintiff had contracted to 

 erect. The defendant advertised for tenders for the erection 

 of a Baptist chapel, stating that the plans and specifications 

 could be seen, and that the quantities of work and material 

 would be furnished. The plaintiff obtained from the defen- 

 dant's office a table of such quantities, headed by a statement 

 that it was to be paid for by the successful competitor. From 

 this table the plaintiff calculated his tender, which was 

 accepted. For the plaintiff it was contended that, independently 

 of the computation, there was an implied undertaking in law 

 that the bill of quantities paid for by the plaintiff should be 

 reasonably correct. For the defendant it was contended that 



