A dishonoured cheque feels like a straightforward problem: someone owes you money and their cheque did not clear. The law agrees with you. What catches people out is not the merits — it is the calendar.
Section 138 creates a criminal remedy for cheque dishonour, and it is genuinely effective. But it is hedged with three sequential deadlines, and missing any one of them can extinguish an otherwise unanswerable claim.
The three deadlines, in order
1. Thirty days to send the notice
The clock starts when you receive the bank's return memo — not when the cheque was written, and not when you remembered to check. From that date you have thirty days to send a written demand notice to the drawer, calling on them to pay.
This notice is not a formality. It must identify the cheque, state the reason for dishonour and demand the cheque amount specifically. A vague letter asking for "the outstanding balance" has repeatedly been held insufficient.
2. Fifteen days for them to pay
Once the notice is served, the drawer has fifteen days to make good the amount. You cannot file before that period expires — a complaint brought early is premature and liable to be dismissed on that ground alone.
3. One month to file
If payment does not arrive, your right to file arises on the sixteenth day and lasts one month. Complaints filed after that window require a formal application for condonation of delay, which is granted on sufficient cause but never guaranteed.
The most common way a good Section 138 case dies is not a weak defence. It is a notice sent on day thirty-two.
What you will need
- The original dishonoured cheque
- The bank's return memo stating the reason for dishonour
- Proof of the underlying debt or liability — invoice, agreement or acknowledgement
- A copy of the demand notice and its dispatch and delivery proof
That last item matters more than people expect. Keep the postal receipt and the tracking record; service of the notice is frequently the first thing disputed.
If you are the one who issued the cheque
Receiving a Section 138 notice is not the end of the matter. There are real defences — that the cheque was given as security rather than in discharge of a debt, that the amount was altered, that no legally enforceable liability existed, or that the notice itself was defective.
The fifteen-day window is also an opportunity. Paying within it stops the prosecution entirely. If you have a genuine dispute about the amount, that is the moment to raise it in writing rather than after a complaint is filed.
The practical takeaway
If a cheque has bounced, note the date on the return memo before you do anything else, and work backwards from it. If more than thirty days have already passed, the position is harder but not always hopeless — a fresh presentation of the cheque, where the instrument is still valid, can restart the cycle.
Either way, the useful step is to have someone look at the dates now rather than after the window has closed.