Section 402.104. Definitions: “merchant"; “between merchants"; “financing agency".

 

(1)  “ Between merchants" means in any transaction with respect to which both parties are chargeable with the knowledge or skill of merchants.

(2)  “Financing agency" means a bank, finance company or other person who in the ordinary course of business makes advances against goods or documents of title or who by arrangement with either the seller or the buyer intervenes in ordinary course to make or collect payment due or claimed under the contract for sale, as by purchasing or paying the seller's draft or making advances against it or by merely taking it for collection whether or not documents of title accompany or are associated with the draft. “Financing agency" includes also a bank or other person who similarly intervenes between persons who are in the position of seller and buyer in respect to the goods ( s. 402.707 ).

(3)  “Merchant" means a person who deals in goods of the kind or otherwise by his or her occupation holds himself or herself out as having knowledge or skill peculiar to the practices or goods involved in the transaction or to whom such knowledge or skill may be attributed by his or her employment of an agent or broker or other intermediary who by his or her occupation holds himself or herself out as having such knowledge or skill.

1983 a. 189 ; 1991 a. 316 ; 2009 a. 322 . Because the status of “merchant" under sub. (3) does not attach to the casual or inexperienced seller, whether a farmer is a merchant rests upon the individualized facts of the case. Harvest States Cooperatives v. Anderson, 217 Wis. 2d 154 , 577 N.W.2d 381 (Ct. App. 1998), 97-2762 . A county as a merchant under the uniform commercial code. 1980 WLR 194.