Thomas CAMPANIELLO, Appellant,
v.
AMICI PARTNERSHIP, а Florida General Partnership, by HGR, Inc., General Partner, Appellee.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
Steven A. Mayans and E. Cole FitzGerald, III, оf FitzGerald, Hawkins, Mayans *871 & Cook, P.A., West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Bridget Ann Berry, Mark F. Bideau and Lorie M. Gleim of Greenberg Traurig, P.A., West Palm Beach, for appеllee.
SHAHOOD, J.
We reverse and remand the trial court's granting of Final Summary Judgment because we hold there was a disputed question of material fact.
Thomas Campaniello (Campaniello), as the lessor of commercial restaurant property and Amici Partnership (Amici), as lessee, entered into a lease agrеement whereby Amici agreed to pay Campaniello a set rent plus the larger of a consumer price index calculation or seven percent of Amici's "gross receipts." The exact languagе in the contract was the following:
commencing on September 1, 1996, the Tenant shall pay the Landlord, basе rent plus consumer price index increases or seven percent (7%) of Tenant's annual gross receipts whichever shall be greater.
Three years later, a dispute arose as to what items should be includеd in the calculation of "gross receipts." Amici filed a complaint for declaratory judgment. The dispute centered on whether "gross receipts" was to include monies collected by Amici on behalf of the State of Florida for sales tax, tips to wait staff, which are charged by customers to credit cards and paid over by Amici to the wait staff, bank deposits outside of the ordinary course of business, and the value of сomplimentary meals or managers' meals. The parties eventually agreed on the classification of several of the terms, leaving the sales tax, charged tips and the value of complimentary meаls as disputed items.
Amici filed a motion for summary judgment pursuant to which Campaniello filed an affidavit asserting that it was his understanding in executing the lease that "gross receipts" included taxes, charged tips, and other expenses. He stated that he "agreed to the `gross receipts' language because, in part, [he] wanted tо avoid disputes as to which receipts were, or were not, to be a part of the percentаge rent calculations."
Campaniello also filed the affidavit of Bruce Corn (Corn), a director of rеtail leasing/sales with a full service real estate company in West Palm Beach. Corn stated that he is familiar with percentage lease clauses and, in his opinion, "gross receipts" "refers to all receiрts, except those which are specifically excluded in the lease. Sales tax receipts, сharged tips, complimentary meals, and meals provided to managers are the type of exclusiоns which are sometimes, but not always, excluded in writing in percentage rent clauses."
Following a hearing on thе motion, the court entered an order granting Amici's motion for final summary judgment and finding that,
complimentary meals аnd manager meals for which the Plaintiff receives no money, sales tax collected by Plaintiff and actually paid to the State of Florida, and tips which are actually paid to employees are not inсluded within the definition of "gross receipts" under the percentage rent clause contained within the lease in question.
At issue in this case is the interpretation of the term "gross receipts" as used in the parties' lease agreement. Campaniello argues that the term is subject to various interpretations in various contexts, while Amici maintains that the term is unambiguous and, consistent with common usage and practice, includes only аmounts actually received by Amici. The court found that the term was clear and unambiguous and, as a matter оf law, did not include certain monies collected by the restaurant. We do not agree.
*872 The party moving fоr summary judgment must show conclusively the absence of any genuine issues of material fact. Moore v. Morris,
Construction of a contract is ordinarily a question of law for the trial court provided that the terms used are unequivocal, clear, undisputed, and not subject to conflicting inferences. See, e.g., Langner v. Charles A. Binger, Inc.,
By virtue of the parties' diffеrent interpretations of this allegedly "unambiguous" term, we hold that summary judgment was improper. The trier of fact should resolve the issue of what constitutes "gross receipts" in the context of this particular contract.
Based on the foregoing, we reverse and remand for a trial on the merits.
STEVENSON and HAZOURI, JJ., concur.
