A woman who purchased two minibuses before receiving permission to operate them has lost a lawsuit against the Bermuda Government over profits lost because of a “misrepresentation”.

Grace-Ann Fox, owner of Mini Mega Transport Services, had launched a legal action against the transport minister alleging that a 2011 letter from a civil servant had suggested that she had been granted an operating permit when she had not.

While permission to operate the vehicles was granted more than a year later, Mrs Fox alleged the misrepresentation cost her $107,200 in profits. The Supreme Court heard that in the summer of 2011, Mrs Fox had sought to expand her business fleet from two minibuses to four, importing the additional vehicles from overseas.

She sent documents to Transport Control Department, including an application to operate a public service vehicle and technical specifications for the minibuses that she wished to import.

Mrs Fox later received a letter dated August 9, 2011, stating that TCD had reviewed the technical specifications and approved for the make and model to be imported for use in Bermuda as a minibus.

She told the court that she understood the letter meant that her application for an operating permit had been granted, but it had not — the misrepresentation at the heart of her claim.

Terry Spencer, who was TCD’s registrations manager at the time, told the court that importing a minibus and operating one required separate approvals resulting from separate approval processes, explaining that the decision whether to approve an operating permit was a matter for the Public Service Vehicles Licensing Board.

He said that shortly after the letter was sent to Mrs Fox, he contacted her to explain that, while she had permission to import the vehicles, she needed to make a separate application to operate them. Mrs Smith said that despite the phone call, at the end of the conversation she was not sure if she had a permit or not.

An application to operate the vehicles went before the board in December 2011, but the decision was deferred because the minister then had placed a moratorium on new minibus permits.

Mrs Fox testified that she had no idea about the moratorium or that the decision had been deferred, but she placed an order for the new minibuses in January 2012. At that time, she said she believed she had permits to operate the vehicles.

The board approved the permits in a September 2012 meeting in which Mr Spencer told the board that, based on instructions from the Attorney-General’s chambers, the moratorium that had previously stalled the application was unlawful because it had not been approved by Cabinet.

While Mrs Fox argued that the misrepresentation cost her more than $100,000, Puisne Judge Stephen Hellman dismissed her claim, noting that she had previously applied for such permits and had experience with the process. In a judgment dated November 20, Mr Justice Hellman found that Mr Spencer’s letter was not a representation that Mrs Fox had received an operation permit. “I am further satisfied that the plaintiff did not believe that it was when she placed an order for the minibuses in January 2012,” it added.

“I need not go on to consider the plaintiff’s claim for damages. However, even if the plaintiff had succeeded on liability, it is not clear to me that she would have suffered any loss.

“The damages which she claims are for loss of the profit which she would have earned had the August 9, 2011 letter granted an operating permit. But it didn’t.

“Whether or not it purported to grant one — and I have found that it did not — is beside the point.”