This lesson assumes you are familiar with the requirement of consideration. It also assumes you are familiar with the rule that past consideration is not good consideration. As you may recall, "past consideration" is a misnomer. If a party makes a promise to pay for a benefit previously conferred, there is no consideration for the promise because the benefit was not bargained for in exchange for the promise. The topic of this lesson is one of the exceptions to this general rule—statutes (whether derived from the common law or, for example, the Uniform Commercial Code) that dispense with consideration.
