Opinion ID: 1167447
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Brown Palace Hotel

Text: On June 28, 1957, the plaintiff and one Schmitz, a salesman working under plaintiff, obtained an order from the Brown Palace Hotel for one accounting machine. This machine was shipped from Dayton, Ohio on March 13, 1958 and arrived in Denver approximately five days thereafter. The Brown Palace Hotel paid for the machine on May 5, 1958, but did not take delivery because the Brown Palace Hotel West, an annex within which the machine was to be installed, had not yet opened. The machine was stored in defendant's branch office until installed on November 28, 1958. The plaintiff received a 7½ seller's commission on this sale, or approximately $455.00. David N. Baptie, who at the time was defendant's office manager in Denver, testified that the plaintiff was entitled to a commission of $1,393.80 as of the date of the sale but that he did not receive the balance because he was not covering the territory when the machine was finally delivered and installed. The balance of the commission ultimately was paid to another salesman who was in charge of the territory at the time that the machine was finally installed. The defendant relies upon the following provision in the contract of employment to defeat the plaintiff's claim to a full commission on this sale: c. Transfer Sales, Exchange Transfers, and Protected Sales. (1) Transfer Sales are sales where the product sold is transferred outside or into your Territory within six months from the date of shipment if a shipment order, or from the date of delivery if delivered from branch consignment. If the product is transferred outside your Territory within such period and your Account has been credited with Territory Commission thereon, such commission credits shall be reversed, except that if the original sale was classified as a Personal Sale, your Account shall be credited with the Seller's Commission thereon as an Inter-Branch or Intra-Branch Sale (as the case may be). When the product sold is transferred into your Territory within such period your Account shall be credited with Territory Commission thereon above provided dependent upon the classification of the sale. The foregoing provision shall likewise apply to successive transfers within such six month period; however, the location of the product sold as of the end of such six month period shall determine the distribution of commission credits regardless of the length of time in such location. The provisions of this subparagraph (1) shall apply regardless of any change in ownership of the product. In the event the product-sold is not placed in use after full settlement, or the product is removed from active use within six months from the date of shipment or delivery from consignment (as the case may be) and your Account has been credited with Territory Commission such credit shall be reversed, except that if the sale was a Personal Sale your Account shall be credited with Seller's Commission thereon as an Intra-Branch or Inter-Branch Sale. When such product is removed from storage and is placed in actual use such commission shall be recredited provided such use occurs in your Territory at a time when it is assigned to you. (Emphasis supplied). The defendant reasons that since the territory was no longer assigned to the plaintiff when the machine was finally installed, the plaintiff was not entitled to his territorial commission on the sale. With this we do not agree. The provisions relating to commissions on items put into storage and subsequently installed are placed, structurally, within that section of the contract dealing specifically with Transfer Sales. The defendant does not assert that the sale to the Brown Palace Hotel was, in fact, a Transfer Sale, but urges that the provisions relating to the storage and subsequent installation of items within that category be given a broader application so as to govern the sale in question. We cannot construe the contract in the manner contended for by the defendant. We think it is clear upon reading the sections here involved that the provisions relating to storage refer only to Transfer Sales which are defined by the contract. The sale to the Brown Palace Hotel is not, in our opinion, within that contract definition of a Transfer Sale. But if there exists any ambiguity as to what transactions are covered by the provisions in question here, those provisions must be interpreted most strongly against the party drawing the contract, in this case the employer-defendant. Six Star Lubricants Co. v. Morehouse, 101 Colo. 491, 74 P.2d 1239; Gardner v. City of Englewood, 131 Colo. 210, 282 P.2d 1084; Lembke Plumbing and Heating v. Hayutin, 148 Colo. 334, 366 P.2d 673. We conclude that the fact that this machine was placed in storage in Denver as an accommodation to the consignee, who was not ready for delivery after the machine was shipped, does not defeat the plaintiff's right to recover his commission thereon. He is not, however, entitled to recover the amount reflected on the split sheet, $1,045.35, which represents 75% of the full $1,393.80 commission in accord with the 75%-25% ratio provided by the split sheet. The evidence is undisputed that he received $455.00 on the sale and he therefore is entitled only to the difference between $1,045.35 and $455.00 or $590.35. The trial court did not refer to this payment in its Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, determining only that the Plaintiff was entitled to his commission at the time of the delivery of the machine in Denver.