Alteration - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition alteration

Definition :

Alteration. An alteration vitiates a deed or other instrument, if made in a material part after execution. In the case of deeds, an unexplained alteration is presumed to have been made at the time of execution; but it is otherwise with wills. See (English) Wills Act, 1837 (7 Wm. 4 & 1 Vict. c. 26), s. 21.

As to alteration of a bill of exchange, see s. 64 of the Bills of Exchange Act, 1882, by which, where a bill is materially altered without the assent of all parties liable on it, the bill is avoided, except as against a party who has himself made, authorized, or assented to the alteration, and subsequent indorsers. But if the alteration is not apparent, and the bill is in the hands of a holder in due course, such holder may avail himself of the bill as if it had not been altered, and may enforce payment of it according to its original tenor. In particular the following alterations are material, namely, any alteration of the date, the sum payable, any alteration of the date, the sum payable, the time of payment, the place of payment, and, where a bill has been accepted generally, the addition of a place of payment without the acceptor's assent. See also Slingsby v. Westminster Bank Ltd. (No. 2), 1931 (2) KB 583 (alteration of payee by adding words 'per C. & P.'), Knock v. Dicks, 1933 (1) KB 307 (inland bill turned into foreign bill).

A lease sometimes contains a covenant by the lessee not to make 'alterations.' For the meaning of such a covenant, see Bickmore v. Dimmer, 1903 (1) Ch 158, and see (English) L. P. Act, 1925, s. 84, as to restrictions in leases, and (English) Landlord and Tenant Act, 1927 (17 & 18 Geo. 5, c. 36), s. 19, also LANDLORD AND TENANT.