Be it clients who refuse to pay or employers sitting on your dues, here’s the legal recourse available to you to get back your money.

Our well experienced staff members can take up your recovery due or sending notices for  recovery due process from start to finish in a very professional manner, and make the whole process as comfortable as a breeze for you. Furthermore, if you have any queries pertaining to the process in general or related to your business in particular, our executives can respond to them proficiently.

What is the scariest thing about lending money to friends and family? What is the number one concern for entrepreneurs operating outside the dotcom space? The answer is the same for both: pending dues getting lost in a black hole. Unlike banks with their well-established recovery machinery, the common man can hardly boast such resources. However , if you are ready to battle it out, there are multiple provisions in the law to help you out.

Process for Recovery of due:

The most common civil remedy for recovering money is Order 37 of the Civil Procedure Code, which allows a creditor to file a summary suit. Compared to normal suits, summary suits are disposed of faster. Once the suit is instituted and the summons are issued, the defendant has 10 days to make an appearance, failing which the court assumes the plaintiff’s allegations to be true and, accordingly, awards the plaintiff. If the defendant makes an appearance, the court accepts his defence only if it is convinced that it is substantial to the case in question.

The summary procedure applies to all suits for recovery of money that arise from written agreements. This could be promissory notes and contracts, bills of exchange or cheques, so long as the plaintiff seeks to recover specific debt. Where the matter How to recover pending dues concerns penalties or any other uncertain amount, one cannot file a summary suit.

Another option is the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881, which only deals with the recovery of money arising from instruments such as bills of exchange or cheques. The Act contains several sections, each outlining the procedure for recovering money under a specific instrument. For instance, Section 138 explains the procedure to deal with a bounced cheque, whereby a legal notice is to be sent to the defaulter within 30 days of receiving the cheque return memo. If the cheque issuer fails to make a fresh payment within 30 days of receiving the notice, the payee has the right to file a criminal complaint under this Section.

However, the complaint should be registered in a magistrate’s court within a month of the expiry of the notice period, otherwise your suit will be timebarred. In other words, it will not be entertained by the court unless you show sufficient and reasonable cause for delay. On receiving the complaint, along with an affidavit and the relevant paper trail, the court will issue summons and hear the matter. If found guilty, the defaulter can be punished with a prison term of two years and/or a fine, which can be as high as twice the cheque amount.