By Jacob Reardon a Solicitor of Matthews Folbigg, in our Insolvency, Restructuring and Debt Recovery Group.
Section 459G(1) of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) (“the Act”) allows a debtor company served with a statutory demand to apply to the Court to have it set aside. Under s 459G(2) any such application must be filed within the 21 day statutory limitation period. This is a strict 21 days and generally cannot be extended.
The operation of s 459G and the strict 21 days limit has led to some controversy in situations where a debtor company has been served with a statutory demand, but does not become aware of the service until after the expiry of the 21 day period. How could it file an application to set aside a demand it did not know about? [...]
