Set Off - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition set-off

Definition :

Set-off, any counter-balance or cross-claim.

A defendant's counter demand against the plaintiff, arising out of transaction independent of plaintiff's claim, Black's Law Dictionary, 7th Edn., p. 1376.

The subject of a set-off under the former practice was a cross debt or claim, on which a separate action might be sustained, due to the party defendant from the party plaintiff. It was a defence crated by 2 Geo.2, c. 22, and had no existence at Common Law, and could only be pleaded in respect of mutual debts of a definite character, and did not apply to a claim founded in damages, or in the nature o a penalty, and the debt must have been due in the same right and between the same parties, and not a mere equitable demand. The defendant could not avail himself of a set-off, unless it were specially pleaded, and particulars thereof delivered with the plea.

It is now provided by (English) R.S.C. 1883, Ord. XIX., r. 3, that a defendant in an action may set off or set up, by way of counter-claim against the claims of the plaintiff, any right or claim, whether such set-off or counter-claim sound in damages or not. Consult Odgers on Pleading, 7th Edn. pp. 236 et seq.