Man told to return Dhs367,000 loan to friend after WhatsApp admission in Abu Dhabi

Abu Dhabi Family, Civil and Administrative Cases Court obligated a man to pay $100,000 or Dhs367,376 plus Dhs20,000 as compensation to his friend after the former had borrowed the money in question from his friend and refused to return it despite his explicit acknowledgment that he owed the money to him through messages exchanged via WhatsApp.

Earlier, the victim filed a lawsuit against his friend in which he requested the court to obligate him to pay him Dhs$100,000, or its equivalent in UAE dirhams plus late payment interest at nine per cent from the date of the legal notice until full payment.

He also requested the court to obligate the defendant to pay Dhs50,000 as compensation for the material, moral and psychological harms he had befallen plus late payment interest on the compensation at nine per cent from the date the judgment became final until full payment.

The plaintiff pleaded that as they were friends, the defendant borrowed a sum of money from him and received it in cash after promising him to repay it as soon as possible.

The defendant, however, failed to fulfill his obligation without legal justification, although he had explicitly acknowledged his debt through WhatsApp messages, which included his promise to repay, his request for methods of payment, his proposal for payment schedule and his admission of the debt before witnesses, he said.

Faced with the defendant’s continued refusal to repay despite repeated amicable requests, the plaintiff served him with a formal legal notice demanding payment within five days, he said, adding that when the defendant failed to comply, he filed this lawsuit with the aforementioned claims.

The court stated that it was established in the documents that the plaintiff filed his lawsuit with the aforementioned requests and attached the social media conversations showing the defendant’s acknowledgment of the amount.

The defendant, on the other hand, did not object to the amount claimed by the plaintiff, nor did he present any defence or plea in the lawsuit when he appeared before the court, the court said, adding that he was hereby obligated to pay the amount of $100,000 to the plaintiff.

The court clarified that, according to Articles 292 and 293/1 of the Civil Transactions Law, the defendant’s failure to repay the debt caused the plaintiff moral harms as embodied in regret and remorse and material harms as embodied in deprivation of money and lost earnings.

Hence, the court estimated the compensation due to the plaintiff for the material harms he had befallen at Dhs10,000 and for the moral harms at Dhs10,000, bringing to Dhs20,000 the total compensation due to the plaintiff.