Legal Dictionary of Pakistan

set off

ub. See COUNTERCLAIM; OFFSET. Cf. RECOUPMENT (3)."Set-off signifies the subtraction or taking away of one demand from another opposite or cross demand, so as to distinguish the smaller demand and reduce the greater by the amount of the less; or, if the opposite demands are equal, to extinguish both. It was also, formerly, sometimes called stoppage, because the amount to be setoff was stopped or deducted from the cross demand." Thomas W. Waterman, A Treatise on the Law of Set-Off, Recoupment, and Counter Claim § 1, at 1 (2d ed. 1872).