Abstract

The gloss concerns acceptance of construction works as one of the duties of the investor as a party to a construction works contract. The Supreme Court judgment refers to the hitherto jurisprudence which provides the investor with the right to refuse acceptance of critically defective construction works. The gloss outlines arguments in favour of the position presented by the Supreme Court, although with a partially critical assessment of the manner and complementarity of the grounds. In the opinion of the author, taking into account the general rules of civil law, including law of obligations and the need to preserve the balance between the parties to a construction works contract, the investor should be given the rights to refuse acceptance of construction works in a situation where they are so critically defective that in practice their object would not be usable for the purpose described in the contract. However, the author sees the need to make the Civil Code provisions on construction works contracts more precise, especially as regards the legal nature of the investor’s duty to accept construction works, which would allow for resolving the dispute that has arisen in the doctrine and jurisprudence as well as would positively affect the commercial practice by making the construction works provisions more uniform. The gloss also contains an analysis of the provisions of exemplary construction works contracts concluded by local government units as investors, which reveals practical significance of the discussed issue.