What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Note that if an individual is listed by name, but their appearance in the case is as a government official, then they should be counted as a government rather than as a private person. For example, in the case "Billy Jones & Alfredo Ruiz v Joe Smith" where Smith is a state prisoner who brought a civil rights suit against two of the wardens in the prison (Jones & Ruiz), the following values should be coded: number of appellants that fall into the category "natural persons" =0 and number that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials" =2. A similar logic should be applied to businesses and associations. Officers of a company or association whose role in the case is as a representative of their company or association should be coded as being a business or association rather than as a natural person. However, employees of a business or a government who are suing their employer should be coded as natural persons. Likewise, employees who are charged with criminal conduct for action that was contrary to the company policies should be considered natural persons.
If the title of a case listed a corporation by name and then listed the names of two individuals that the opinion indicated were top officers of the same corporation as the appellants, then the number of appellants should be coded as three and all three were coded as a business (with the identical detailed code). Similar logic should be applied when government officials or officers of an association were listed by name.
Your specific task is to determine the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the appellant is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

Opinion:
GULF CONTRACTING, Plaintiff-Cross Claim Appellant, v. BIBB COUNTY, Defendant-Third Party Plaintiff, Dore Wrecking Company and Reliance Insurance, Third Party Defendants-Cross Claim Defendants-Appellees. GULF CONTRACTING, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DORE WRECKING COMPANY and Reliance Insurance, Defendants-Appellees. GULF CONTRACTING, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Arthur P. DORE, Defendant-Appellee. GULF CONTRACTING, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DENNIS & DENNIS, Ward Dennis, Individually and d/b/a Dennis & Dennis, Peter Dennis, Individually and d/b/a Dennis & Dennis, Defendants-Third Party Plaintiffs-Appellees, Dore Wrecking Company, Third Party Defendant. GULF CONTRACTING, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DORE WRECKING COMPANY, Reliance Insurance and Arthur P. Dore, Defendants-Appellees.
No. 85-8964
Non-Argument Calendar.
United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.
Aug. 8, 1986.
C. James Jessee, Jr., Atlanta, Ga., for the plaintiff-appellant.
Albert P. Reichert, Hendley V. Napier, Robert R. Gunn, II, Macon, Ga., for the defendants-appellees.
Before FAY, JOHNSON and CLARK, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Appellant Gulf Contracting, Inc. brings this appeal from the district court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of appellees Peter and Ward Dennis and their business entities. Appellant was the general contractor for the Bibb County Law Enforcement Center constructed in 1976 in Macon, Georgia. Appellant sued appellees for negligent acts and omissions in connection with appellees’ work as project architects and engineers for the Center. The district court entered summary judgment for ap-pellees on grounds that appellees owed no professional duty to appellant nor did privity of contract exist to support a cause of action. Appellant alleges error in these holdings. We agree and therefore reverse the judgment below.
This suit, along with several others, grew out of the following events. In 1975, Dore Wrecking Company was hired by Bibb County to prepare the Center site for construction. This work required removal of certain subsurface debris, including footings, foundations and concrete slabs left from a previous structure on the site. Rather than remove all the debris, Dore Wrecking intentionally removed only a portion and covered over the rest with dirt.
Although appellees were contractually obligated to supervise Dore’s work, appel-lees failed to discover the remaining debris through inspection. Appellees did receive notice of the problem, however, through a soil test report indicating concrete under the site surface. Nonetheless, appellees did not disclose the existence of the debris in their final plans, specifications and drawings for the Center. In reliance on these plans, appellant submitted the lowest bid for general contracting of the Center.
When appellant began construction in 1976, the debris was discovered. Appellant expended additional time and expense in removing it, but was not compensated for this non-contract work. Subsequently, appellant sued appellees, as well as Dore, the County and other entities, to recover costs in the amount of almost $1,600,000. Appellant’s actions against all parties but appel-lees have either been settled or dismissed, and therefore only the question of appel-lees’ liability is before us now.
The district court premised summary judgment in this diversity action on Georgia law. Section 51-l-ll(a) of the Georgia Code provides that:
[N]o privity is necessary to support a tort action; but, if the tort results from the violation of a duty which is itself the consequence of a contract, the right of action is confined to the parties and those in privity to that contract, except in cases where the party would have a right of action for the injury done independently of the contract____ (emphasis added).
The district court read appellant’s complaint to state, a claim of negligence founded on appellees’ contractual obligations to design and supervise the project. Thus, it concluded that privity was necessary, since Georgia common law imposes no duty of professional service in favor of third parties not in privity to the contract for such service. Appellant could not establish privity and summary judgment was granted in favor of appellees.
The error in the district court's holding lies in its construction of Georgia common law. It is true that for many years, Georgia imposed no general duty of reasonable care upon those rendering professional services. See, e.g., Mauldin v. Sheffer, 113 Ga.App. 874, 150 S.E.2d 150, 154 (1966). Recently, however, the Georgia courts have moved away from a rigid privity requirement. An exception to the requirement will be implied where policy considerations weigh in favor of liability. See RhodesHaverty Partnership v. Robert & Co. Assoc., 163 Ga.App. 310, 293 S.E.2d 876, 878 (1982), aff'd, 250 Ga. 680, 300 S.E.2d 503 (1983) .
Privity is not required to support an action for negligent misrepresentation by “[o]ne who, in the course of his business, profession or employment, ... supplies false information for the guidance of others in their business transactions.” Rhodes-Haverty, 300 S.E.2d at 504 n. 1 (quoting Restatement (Second) of Torts § 552 (1977)). Liability is limited, however, to “a foreseeable person or , limited class of persons for whom the information was intended.” Id. at 504. Those persons must also show reasonable reliance on the false information, specifically that the information was given for the purpose of inducing their reliance. See id.
One of appellant's claims fits squarely within this exception. Appellant contends that appellees negligently failed to disclose the remaining subsurface debris in the specifications, plans, drawings, plats and surveys describing the Bibb County Law Enforcement Center. Those specifications were obviously prepared for a limited class of persons, namely firms bidding for contracts to build all or a portion of the Center. Reliance on the specifications and other materials by such persons was also reasonable because the information therein is vital to the bidding process. Thus, appellees may be liable to third parties such as appellant for their failure to adequately describe construction requirements through their specifications and materials. Summary judgment was improperly granted and the parties should proceed to trial on this claim.
The order below is REVERSED and REMANDED.
. Contrary to the district court’s suggestion, exceptions to the privity requirement are not limited to cases involving "professional opinions." See North American Co. for Life & Health v. Berger, 648 F.2d 305 (5th Cir. Unit B 1981) (negligent misrepresentation in psychiatrist's opinion of disability). The Georgia Supreme Court’s use of the Restatement indicates that false facts as well as false opinions are actionable. Indeed, the Restatement specifically refers to false “information,” drawing omissions as well as misstatements within the scope of general liability. See Rhodes-Haverty, supra (failure to disclose certain facts held actionable).
. Appellant’s other claims are based on appel-lees' negligent failure to supervise Dore Wrecking and to approve change orders and additional compensation for the work done by appellant. None of these acts and omissions fall within the privity exception for negligent misrepresentation. Consequently, summary judgment on these claims was not improper.
. We emphasize that our opinion in this case should not be construed to impose on architects and engineers a general duty to disclose on plans and specifications all sub-surface conditions affecting construction. The exact nature and scope of an architect’s or engineer’s duty is not an issue before us, and we have not considered it. We merely hold that privity is not a prerequisite, in these circumstances, for a cause of action against an architect or engineer.

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "private business and its executives"? Answer with a number.

Choices:

Answer: 1