Formalities in the law of contract and their impact on visually impaired persons as consumers

Abstract

The problem identified concerns the lack of the South African law to reasonably accommodate visually impaired persons, with specific reference to the law of contract, as found in the common law and consumer protection legislation. This jurisprudential lack of reasonable accommodation is limited to the formality requirement of ‘in writing’. The aim of this mini-dissertation will be to analyse the current legal position in such a manner so as to identify where the common law and relevant consumer protection laws fail to accommodate, discriminate against, show a disregard for and neglect the interests of visually impaired persons. In addition, I will provide an exposition of what the legal position vis-à-vis visually impaired persons ought to be in the context of the problem as already identified above. Consequently, the following normative question will be answered: ‘How ought the principle of reasonable accommodation influence the formality requirement of ‘in writing’, in both consumer legislation and the common law?’.