5 Belgium »
Marc Vermylen
From: Set-Off Law and Practice: An International Handbook (3rd Edition)
Edited By: William Johnston, Thomas Werlen, Frederick Link
This chapter provides an overview of the law of set-off in Belgium. Set-off is a recognized legal concept in Belgian law and can occur in one of three ways: by operation of law (legal set-off), court order (judicial set-off), or agreement (contractual set-off). Under the Belgian Civil Code, set-off has been considered primarily not as a security technique but as a means of facilitating payments between two reciprocal debtors. After discussing the legal framework of set-off in Belgium, the chapter considers set-off between solvent parties. In particular, it explains legal set-off, judicial set-off, contractual set-off, and multilateral set-off. It then examines set-off in insolvency, taking into account legal set-off and contractual set-off against insolvent parties. Finally, it analyses isses arising in cross-border set-off.
