Legal Definitions - severally

Severally means that parties involved in an agreement or legal situation are individually and separately responsible for their own obligations or liabilities, rather than being collectively responsible for the entire amount. Each party's responsibility is distinct from the others.

Here are some examples to illustrate this concept:

• Contractual Debt: Imagine three business partners, Sarah, Tom, and Ursula, decide to take out a loan for their new venture. The bank's loan agreement specifies that they are "severally liable" for the repayment. This means that if the total loan is $150,000 and they each agreed to be responsible for $50,000, the bank can only pursue Sarah for her $50,000, Tom for his $50,000, and Ursula for her $50,000. The bank cannot demand the full $150,000 from just one of them if the others fail to pay their share.

• Professional Negligence: A group of architects, working independently on different aspects of a large building project, are sued for design flaws. The court determines that their liability is "severally." This means the court will assess the specific portion of damage caused by each architect's individual negligence. For example, if Architect A's error caused $100,000 in damages and Architect B's error caused $50,000, Architect A is only responsible for the $100,000 attributable to their actions, and Architect B is only responsible for their $50,000. Neither can be held accountable for the other's mistakes.

• Environmental Remediation: A government agency identifies three different manufacturing companies, Alpha Corp, Beta Inc., and Gamma Ltd., as contributors to pollution in a local river. After investigation, the agency orders them to clean up the river, specifying that their responsibility is "severally." This means each company is assigned a distinct portion of the cleanup cost based on the amount of pollution they individually contributed. Alpha Corp might be responsible for 30% of the cost, Beta Inc. for 50%, and Gamma Ltd. for 20%. Each company is only obligated to pay for its specific, separate share of the remediation effort.