Marasi 26 full-web

LEGAL REPORT
CyDigging deep:
utilizing available legal tools for
effective debt recovery
requests, but in some cases it may
be possible to request the court to
appoint an expert with a view to investigating
status and details of the
corporate debtor.
The case study below demonstrates
that if a party is struggling
with identifying assets for the purposes
of starting attachment proceedings,
it may be possible to utilize
the attachment proceedings in court
for the purposes of asset investigation.
To set the scene for the case study,
the claimant contracted to carry out
design and supply of certain modules
and equipment to the defendby
Mohamed El Hawawy,
Partner, Ince & Co Middle
East LLP
The problem of debt recovery in
the United Arab Emirates (“UAE”)
remains of high interest to our clients
both locally and abroad. In this
article we want to highlight the tools
that are available for deft recovery if
you are prepared to put time and effort
in it.
Any debt collection process should
start with the asset investigation exercise
where you identify the debtor’s
assets. If you skip this step, the creditor
risks wasting significant amount
of time and costs in court or arbitration
if the debtor does not have any
assets which can be seized to satisfy
the debt.
The easiest information to get hold
of is that which is publicly available.
Unfortunately, in the UAE very little
information is open to the public.
By far the most prudent approach is
to obtain as much as information as
possible about your counterparty at
the time when you enter into contract
with them or during performance
of the contract.
Struggling with identifying assets
Typically, the asset investigation
exercise precedes the any judicial
procedure for obtaining security over
these assets. In the UAE, there is no
mechanism for pre-action disclosure
70 JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2018