Acceptance by Telephone.

Ordinarily acceptance of an offer may be made by telephone unless the circumstances are such that by the intent of the parties or the law of the state no acceptance can be made or contract arise in the absence of a writing.

A telephoned acceptance is effective when and where the acceptance is spoken into the phone.19 Consequently, where an employee who lived in Kansas applied for a job to work in Missouri and the employer telephoned from Missouri to Kansas accepting the application, the employment contract was a Missouri contract because the acceptance by the employer was spoken into the phone in that state and therefore the Kansas Workers' Compensation statute did not apply when the employee was subsequently injured.

Auction Sales.

At an auction sale the statements made by ihe auctioneer to draw forth bids are merely invitations to negotiate. Each bid is an offer, which is not accepted until the auctioneer indicates that a particular offer or bid is accepted. Usually this is done by the fall of the auctioneer's hammer, indi­cating that the highest bid made has been accepted. As a bid is merely an offer, the bidder may withdraw the bid at any time before it is accepted by the auctioneer.

Ordinarily the auctioneer may withdraw any article or all of the property from the sale if not satisfied with the amounts of the bids that are being made. Once a bid is accepted, however, the auctioneer cannot cancel the sale. In addition, if it had been announced that the sale was to be made "without reserve," the goods must be sold to the person making the highest bid regardless of how low that may be.