• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.21
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• pp.3-37
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• 2003

English law accepts the basic principle of freedom of contract that the parties should be free to agree on any terms that they like unless their agreement is illegal or otherwise contrary to public policy because it infringes some public interest. On the other hand, it has been limited for hundreds of years on the basis that certain contract terms, particularly in standard form, may alter a distribution of risks that the customer would reasonably intended. The alteration may often result from his simple ignorance caused by either lack of opportunity to become aware of clauses or inability to understand their full potential implications. In addition, it may also result from disparity in bargaining power which does not allow the customer to look after their own interests even if he is fully aware of the unacceptable clauses. In response to this problem, English law has employed both judicial and statutory intervention techniques to control unfair contract terms. This study describes and analyzes in detail how English law regulates such terms, particularly, in standard form, in order to provide legal advice to our sellers residing either in UK or in Korea who plan to enter into UK markets. It also attempts to explore any problem in the existing double legislations of UCTA and UTCCR and put forward future direction of English law in light of the Draft Unfair Terms Bill which was currently proposed by the Law Commissioners. The main concern of this paper will be confined to some of the various aspects of both judicial and statutory control of unfair contract terms in English law which may draw our attention in terms of domestic or international business sales.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.89-106
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• 1998

Standard contsacts are drafted by one side only and therefore naturally favour that party. The other party must either adhere to those terms or abandon the transaction entirely. Accordingly the terms in these contracts tend to by quite harsh, especially so in consumer transactions. The objectives of this study are to examine the degree of consumer knowledge practical use, experience of consumer problems on service contract terms and to investigate the factors which influence on the degree of experience of consumer problems related the contract terms. The data used in this empirical study included 685 consumers experienced transactions with the terms in the last two years in Seoul. Statistics used for data analysis ere Reliability, Frequencies, Means, Standard Deviation and Multiple Regression Analysis. The conclusions can be summarized as follows. 1) Actually, consumers experienced many problems related the service-contract terms, despite regulation of unfair contract terms. 2) The level of education and purchasing experience variables have affected positively to the level of consumer problem experiences related the contract terms. 3) The effect of trend and characteristics of contract terms are variables with the type of contract terms. Therefore the regulation of the contract terms have to by differently enforced according to the type of contract terms.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.101-114
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• 2002

This study analyzes the contract terms to explore whether the content has any improper and/or unfair clause, reviews the consumer-related laws, and examines the activities of the regulatory systems in the telecommunication service markets. The major resets of the stud\ulcorner are: first, the level of regulation to contract terms is inconsistent across the services areas and needs to be coordinated; second, the standard contract terms need to be developed; third, the policy implications with respect to regulatory policy making and public education are developed; and lastly establishment of consumer advisory board to advise the commission on consumer issues and the consumer information and education center is suggested.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.321-351
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• 2004

According to increase of Franchise Agreements, troubles related to those agreements and trading acts occur frequently. As Franchise system had come from Western countries, franchise agreement troubles tend to international disputes. In fact, those parties entered into a franchise agreement prefer arbitration to lawsuit as a dispute resolution system because arbitration is easy to risk-management for cost and time. The essential conditions for Franchise agreements are as follows ; for Franchise to grant Intellectual Properties to Franchisee, to give an impression of the same company between Franchise and Franchisee, to control and support Franchisee, for Franchisee to be an independent merchant, and to pay Franchiser license fee. Because Franchise Agreement is also based on liberty of contract, Franchise and Franchisee could enter into any kind of agreement. However, Franchiser can make an unfair agreement abusing a position of advantage. This paper check those unfair terms and conditions in Franchise agreement. Once they enter into an agreement, they should fulfil their contract. In case of trouble on performing the contract, both of them have to discuss to solve that trouble faithfully. But, they enter into either lawsuit or arbitration in accordance with agreement when they can't reach a decision in general. Specially, which is the most popular dispute resolution hands in case of Intellectual Property License agreement. General international Franchise Agreements have arbitration terms, but there is other case such as separate Arbitration Agreement if the want, which is separate from Franchise License agreement, so even though Franchise License agreement is invalidated, Arbitration agreement continues to exist, This paper reviews Franchise system and the terms of arbitration in Franchise agreement.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.58
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• pp.215-236
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• 2013

It is quite true that the more Korean contractors receive overseas contracts, the more they need guarantees. The top market for them is the Middle East countries, consisting of more than the half of the total amount awarded last year and the trend is increasing as well. The problem, however, is that employers in these countries are reluctant to use international rules for guarantee such as URDG or ISP98 and easily make unfair callings. However, Korean contractors(applicants), especially small and medium sized enterprises(SMEs) tend to hurriedly enter a contract without looking into its contents as well as guarantees. They do not realize the importance of the guarantees until they receive callings from the employers(beneficiaries). Being independent from the underlying contracts, guarantee is the equivalent to cash in that it usually does not require any proof of demand when calling and the guarantor should make a payment within usually 5 business days after the request. It is often observed these days that several Korean SMEs go bankrupt due to liquidity risks after receiving unfair callings from employers in the Middle East countries. In retrospect, some cases could be obviated if contractors were a little more careful in checking the contents of a guarantee at the time of concluding a contract. For example, there is one case where the underlying contract includes a reduction clause in the Advance Payment bond and the guarantee does not have that clause. In the end, the Korean contractor had to take the whole burden of the bond amount though it had finished 81% of the project. Nobody could argue that contractors should take a full responsibility if they fail in their obligations. However, the employer's wrongful callings need to be prevented in the first place, if possible. As there shouldn't be a case where one party is at a disadvantage against the other like the case mentioned above, useful insight is being sought to minimize unfair calling risks for the benefit of the applicant. First, the applicant should carefully look into every detail of the potential guarantee before signing a contract, heeding especially that there is a reduction clause in the AP bond. Second, the governing principles for guarantee should be the ones that are internally used such as URDG758 that is objective in terms of callings given that, for example, it specifies that the requirement for a supporting statement when making a demand is a default rule. It is also recommended that the form of guarantees be the standard demand guarantee. Third, parties involved in issuing guarantees are advised to understand international rules for guarantee like URDG758 and ISP98 and to play a key role in guiding SME contractors in Korea so that they can protect themselves from possible wrongful callings, particularly from employers in the Middle East countries. I hope this study would give a wake-up call for Korean SMEs wishing to do business in the Middle East countries and remind them of the importance of guarantee itself and its governing principles.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.32
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• pp.29-56
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• 2006

This article primarily concerns the various aspects of the rules to control express terms particularly in standard form which seek to absolve either wholly or in part from the seller's liability for non-conforming goods. It describes and analyzes in detail how English law regulates such terms. In this analysis, it places the following questions; first, whether each jurisdiction treats the seller's liability for non-conformity in quality and quantity as mandatory rules, second, if it does, to what extent it is treated so and third, if not, in what way it controls the seller's attempt to exclude or restrict his liability for non-conformity in quality and quantity. In addition, it attempts to compare the rules under English law with those under Korean law and to evaluate them in light of the discipline of comparative law. In an attempt to evaluate them, it asks the question of whether a solution from one jurisdiction may facilitate the systematic development and reform of another jurisdiction. The evaluation is based upon the idea that the problems of fairness associated with the use of standard terms occur where the customer is unfairly taken by surprise due to his ignorance of the terms, or where even if he knows of the substance of the terms and objects to it, he is met with a take-it-or-leave-it situation.

• Industrial Engineering and Management Systems
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.413-419
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• 2015

This study solved the problem of unstable production chains by considering allocation rate conformance. We proposed two phased algorithm suitable for solving production planning that considers allocation rate conformance; the first phase was heuristic initial solution generation, and the second phase was tabu-search based solution improvement. By using three data sets which have different sizes of data and three different criteria, the results of proposed algorithm were compared with MIP results. The proposed algorithm showed the best production plan in terms of allocation rate conformance, and it was appropriate for other criteria; it solved the problem of unstable production chains by solving concentrated and unfair allocation.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.69
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• pp.127-151
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• 2016

UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts(PICC) was published in 1994. PICC has been functioned as a guideline of international commercial contracts, an applicable law to govern a contract by the agreement of the parties to a contract, general principles of law and lex mercatoria. In addition, PICC has a role of interpreting or supplementing international uniform law instruments as well as domestic laws, and also has served as a model for national and international legislations. PICC has been accepted as a authoritative source of knowledge of international trade usages of international commercial contracts to the arbitral tribunal rather than domestic court because it excluded the characteristics of hard law at the drafting stage. This article dealt with the rule on gross disparity of validity which fall outside the scope of UN Convention on Contract for the International Sale of Goods(CISG), which has obtained a leading legal position of uniform law in international sales of good. In other words, PICC suggests a series of meaningful solutions to the issue of gross disparity of contract which is the most complicated among legal disputes occurring during the process of conclusion of contact and also extremely different and diverse between legal systems. This article covered the issue of gross disparity of contract at the conclusion of contact and suggested the legal basis of several rules related to the gross disparity by analysing gross disparity rule of PICC. Furthermore, this article suggested legal check points or implication as well as interpretation and evaluation on doctrine of laesio enormis and undue influence or unconscionability. This article also dealt with a comparative analysis with Principles of European Contract Law(PECL) and Common European Sales Law(CESL) which have important legal positions in the area of international commercial contract as well as in terms of close relationship to PICC by linking with recent court or arbitral tribunal rulings.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.424-435
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• 2022

When the owners of the intellectual property rights of digital content have lost control over it in the digital environment, there emerged fears that the intellectual property laws, especially copyright law, would not be effective as in the material (Offline ) world. The reason is that the digital environment helps to reproduce copies in high quality and at almost no cost, while copyright law protection has been limited to programs embedded in CDs. According to copyright laws, the owner of the program did not have the right to prevent buyers of the initial physical copy of the program from copying and reselling it to more than one individual without the permission of the original owner. As a result, business owners have invented the idea of licensing digital content and programs instead of selling them. They set out terms that serve their commercial interests regardless of their abuse to intellectual property laws or even the rules of the traditional contract to sell a material property. The abuse has resulted from the way those terms are concluded and the heavy rules that are unfair to consumer rights. Therefore, business owners insisted on dealing with the website and its programs and digital content as material property. Here raises the question of whether the website and its digital content are subject to the protection of copyright law or the rules of the traditional contract or licensing contracts. As the answer to this question affects the protection of consumer rights, is it possible to find a balance between it and the protection of the owners of digital programs' rights.That is what we will discuss in this paper.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.58
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• pp.179-213
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• 2013

While a performance type guarantee is required as a security for non-performance risk by a seller, a payment guarantee is used as a security for non-payment risk by a buyer(or a borrower in a loan agreement). A payment guarantee is a type of independent bank guarantee, bank guarantee, bond, demand guarantee, or standby letter of credit. A guarantor accepts a credit risk of a principal which is normally a buyer in a contract for sale of goods. A payment guarantee is independent of the underlying relationship between the applicant and the beneficiary. The guarantor is only empowered to examine the beneficiary's demand and determine the payment on its face to the terms of the guarantee. A payment guarantee is thus different from a suretyship. The principle of independence carries a significant advantages for a guarantor as well as for a beneficiary. While a documentary credit requires B/L, commercial invoice, packing list, inspection certificate, etc., a typical payment guarantee does not require any evidence for a seller's performance of the underlying contract other than written demand. In this respect payment guarnatee can be a more secured facility than a documentary credit. A payment guarantee normally comes into force from the issuing date and shall remain in effect until all sums guaranteed shall be paid in full by a buyer(or a borrower) or by a guarantor. Although a guarantor shall pay a demand made in accordance with the terms and conditions of the payment guarantee, a payment demand may be denied when it is determined to be abusive or unfair.