Question 2

Read the scenario and answer the questions below:

Before George was able to come to a payment arrangement with Keith, he heard from his brother, Joe, that he had lost the sum of $2500 gambling at the casino and therefore, could not now lend him this sum. George, who is a kitchen fitter, is still very short on work and does not know how he is going to pay Keith.

Keith managed to resolve his position with the Tax Office because he discovered that his wife was entitled to a tax refund of $2400 and he was able to use this sum to pay off his debt.

Keith also owns another property in North Ward. He is currently in employment but has job concerns as he has heard that the bank where he works may introduce some job cuts due to the deteriorating economic climate. Keith is not certain yet if he will be affected by the job cuts or not.

Keith has a problem with his property in North Ward, which is untenanted and needs a new kitchen to be installed. Keith actually has the new kitchen available, having won it in a competition at his local Bunnings store. The problem is that Keith does not have the skills to install the kitchen himself. He thinks that the labour costs would be about $2500 but Keith does not have this sum available, and is very doubtful as to whether he would be able to borrow any more money to pay for the installation of the kitchen. In any event Keith is not keen to borrow more money, bearing in mind the concerns he has about his job position.

The difficulty is that Keith needs to have the new kitchen installed so that he can rent his North Ward property and therefore have an income from the property to assist with the payment of his mortgage on it.

Keith is concerned about the current situation as the bank has written to him and told him to put his account in order and to pay the outstanding mortgage repayments.

In these changed circumstances set out above, how could this matter be resolved using an integrative negotiation approach? Describe this approach and indicate the tactical skills and approaches that the parties could adopt to achieve a successful outcome.