Quantum Meruit
Latin: 'as much as is deserved'. A claim for reasonable remuneration for work done or services rendered where there is no express agreement on price, or the contract has been partly performed and then frustrated or breached.
Independent editorial summary — not the official statute text. Read the official version on legislation.gov.uk.
Where a contract for services does not fix a price, the law implies an obligation to pay a reasonable sum rather than leaving the supplier unremunerated. Section 15 of the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982 gives statutory effect to this principle for contracts for services: “Where, under a relevant contract for the supply of a service, the consideration for the service is not determined by the contract, left to be determined in a manner agreed by the contract or determined by the course of dealing between the parties, there is an implied term that the party contracting with the supplier will pay a reasonable charge.”
The Act leaves the amount to be assessed on the facts of each case: “what is a reasonable charge is a question of fact.” This statutory implied term reflects the same underlying idea as a quantum meruit claim in equity and restitution — that a person who has done work or supplied a service for another, without an agreed price, should recover a reasonable sum for what was actually done, rather than nothing at all or an arbitrarily fixed amount.
Related terms
Official sources
This explanation is drawn from the official sources below; every substantive statement is verified against them. For advice on a specific matter, see our find help page.