Legal Question in Business Law in Illinois

Re: Marking check ''paid in full'' valid?

I litigated the identical situation for a client within the recent past. In that case, the client was assessed $15/mo. late fees. I discovered, however, that the condo's declaration only authorized late fees of $1. The condo board had voted to increase the late fee from $1 to $15; however, under the terms of the declaration, an increase in the late fees could not be made by a 2/3 vote of the members of the condo association.

The long & short of it was that the condo board had acted inappropriately in seeking to collect any amount over $1 and, by successfully winning on this point, we were able to force the condo board to return over $65,000 in wrongfully collected late fees.

So: Check your declaration.

-- Kenneth J. Ashman; [email protected]; www.lawyers.com/alo

Re: Marking check ''paid in full'' valid?

In your description of the problem you fail to state exactly where you put the notation. If you wrote it in the memo area it is not binding. The language must be on the back of the check just above the signature line and it must be for a genuine dispute.