Recovery Notice (Money Due)

When you need it

A formal, written demand to someone who owes you money — under a loan, a promissory note, the unpaid price of goods or services, or professional fees — before you sue to recover it. Sets out what is owed, how it arose, the interest claimed, and a clear deadline to pay, so the Recipient cannot later say no demand was made and so the notice itself becomes evidence if the matter goes to court. Purpose-built for a plain money debt, which is why it carries content the library's other notices do not: how the debt is computed, the interest position, and the fact that a suit on a written loan document, a promissory note, or a bill of exchange may qualify for the summary procedure under Order XXXVII of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 once a suit is filed. Not the Cheque Dishonour Legal Notice, which is the mandatory notice s.138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 requires after a cheque bounces, with its own strict timetable and its own criminal consequence — use that one instead if a cheque has bounced, even if the underlying debt is the same one this notice would otherwise cover. Not the Legal Notice for Recovery of Arrears, which is written for arrears of commercial rent under a lease. Not the Legal Notice (General Purpose), this library's catch-all for a civil wrong with no purpose-built notice of its own — that one can be used for a money debt too, but carries none of the debt-specific content this one does. Pairs naturally with the Cheque Dishonour Legal Notice as the two notices behind most private debt recovery: this one for the underlying debt, that one if a cheque given towards it is later dishonoured.

What follows is written for Punjab and Chandigarh. It states the position there rather than describing how it varies, so the amounts below are the ones that apply — worth confirming at the sub-registrar’s office, because rates change. If the property is anywhere else in India, none of this is yours.