Checklist · Insolvency, Restructuring & Bankruptcy
Creditor's statutory demand (Form 509H) and verifying affidavit: drafting and service checklist
Step-by-step checklist for preparing, checking and serving a creditor's statutory demand on a company, and for the debtor's 21-day set-aside window, so the demand survives a challenge.
- Kind
- Checklist. Steps or checks to work through and tick off.
- Where it applies
- Australia
- AI use
- Red Keep AI out of the decisive steps. A lawyer does the work.
- Law stated as at
- 17 October 2026
- Status
- Maintained. Checked against the cited sources on 17 October 2026.
- Version
- 1
- Source
- Written for this library
When to use it
Use before a creditor serves a statutory demand under s 459E of the Corporations Act, or when a company client has just been served with one. Do not use for individual debtors (use the bankruptcy notice route) or where the debt is genuinely disputed.
How AI may be used
Lawyer-led. A defect or a wrong date can sink the demand or the winding up, and the verifying affidavit is the deponent's own evidence. AI may only extract and compare figures and particulars from documents the lawyer has opened.
AI may
- Extract invoice dates, credits and payments from the creditor's ledger into a schedule of amounts said to be due, with a source reference on every line.
- Compare the draft demand's debtor name, ACN, registered office and schedule total against the ASIC extract and the ledger, and list every difference.
- Index service evidence (photos, receipts, file notes) into a factual timeline, leaving disputed dates unresolved.
AI must not
- Must not draft, scaffold or rephrase any part of the verifying affidavit.
- Must not decide whether there is a genuine dispute or offsetting claim.
- Must not calculate the compliance or set-aside deadline as the date the firm relies on; a person calculates it and a second person checks it.
- Must not receive the client's ledgers or the debtor's correspondence in a tool whose terms allow training on inputs.
The lawyer checks
- Every amount in the schedule reconciles to invoices, credits and payments, and nothing is included that is not yet due.
- Debtor particulars match an ASIC extract obtained on the day the demand is finalised.
- The affidavit is sworn on or after the date of the demand by a deponent who can verify the debt.
- Date and method of service are proved and the 21-day period is diarised by two people.
Method: how the Green, Yellow and Red levels are decided. This is guidance for planning, not legal advice.
Official form
Open the official form. Always use the current version from the issuer.
Read the full text
The full text is for signed-in accounts. It is free. When you sign in you can:
- read the whole precedent, with its drafting notes beside it;
- copy it, or download it as a Word file or Markdown;
- add it to your firm’s knowledge base, so colleagues can find it;
- let the AI tools you connect read it from that knowledge base.
The summary, the law it rests on and the AI-use guidance above stay public. Privacy.
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