MCA Glossary: 30 Terms Your Contract, Collector, and Court Papers Actually Use (Plus 35 You Must Ask About)

The same dollar can appear as a purchase price, a receipt, or part of a damages claim, depending on the document in front of the owner. What the owner defines, or fails to define, before signing decides which of those roles the dollar will play.

Thirty definitions below come from captured opinions, statutes, or orders, with nineteen further definitions named for counsel walkthrough and sixteen more terms needing the signed agreement. Compare and match each definition against the signed agreement.

Amounts and Revenue Terms

The cited appellate decision described a sale of future receivables for a stated sum: rights to payment arising from business transactions. Future revenues served the same role in a later appellate decision, about a 25 percent revenue stream.

Purchase price names the amount the provider pays for the described receivables. One captured agreement paired a purchase price of $100,990 with a purchased amount of $129,267.20, and the gap explains the economics. Purchased amount refers to the receipts figure described as purchased, which can exceed the purchase price.

Rarely does a single word decide a case, though specified percentage comes close: the contractual share used in calculating collections, left blank in one record. Reconciliation compares collections with actual receipts and addresses the difference under the agreement terms. The remittance is an estimate, and estimates invite proof. Sole discretion adjustment lets the funder adjust at its sole discretion, which supported a triable usury defense.

Absolute or contingent repayment states the test the courts quote: a principal sum must be repayable in all circumstances to count as a loan. Finite term describes a defined performance period, and a projected period may differ from a contractual deadline. These two rows decide more than all but extremely careful readers expect, in most files we see, though the sample is not scientific.

Read the definition in the agreement before applying any paragraph above.

Default, Guaranty, and Defenses

The guaranty decides who pays when the company cannot. Personal guaranty of performance describes the promise two individuals signed covering the business representations and covenants, enforceable against the signer upon bankruptcy.

Event of default means an occurrence the contract identifies as triggering stated consequences. Acceleration makes the full uncollected amount due at once upon such events. A guaranty signed without reading behaves like a seatbelt fastened after the stop: present for the photograph, absent for the impact.

Criminal usury was assertable as an affirmative defense under the cited statutes but not as a counterclaim. Substance over form judges a transaction by its real character rather than the name the parties gave it. The transaction was a purchase. The court kept the usury defense alive. Confession of judgment describes the instrument one agreement required upon bankruptcy and that providers filed in order to obtain judgments without contest, a course held fraud on that record. Affidavit for confession means the sworn paper stating the sum with the county of residence, and joint debtor confession binds only those who confessed.

Control, Assignment, and Liens

The federal order against two providers required lien termination statements, case satisfactions, and with prejudice dismissals within thirty days, and its duties bound the settling parties rather than the industry. UCC lien termination statement describes the filing required for any lien, and satisfaction of judgment means the filing required for concluded cases.

Control of deposit account is the legal status recognized through five statutory routes. Signed control record means the three party signed arrangement in which the bank agrees to follow secured party instructions without further consent from the debtor, under the New York statute on control of deposit accounts (a distinction that counsel will insist on even when owners miss it). Perfected first priority interest states the Texas gate for automatic debits in covered transactions.

Account debtor names the obligor on the relevant account or payment intangible, often the customer rather than the funded business. Notification of assignment means the signed notice directing payment to the assignee, under the New York rules on assignment notification. Termination statement for a financing statement ends the effectiveness of that filing under the applicable rules, under the New York statute on termination of financing statements. Release means the agreement relinquishing the claims its text covers, no broader. Zero balance letter means a creditor written acknowledgment of the account position after payment. Most collection letters rely on the owner never reading the statute behind them.

Court Papers

Complaint states the plaintiff claims with the relief requested, and its allegations are not findings. For a New York action, the New York rules on voluntary discontinuance supply the background procedure, with dismissal without prejudice unless stated otherwise. But a docket entry is a clerk summary rather than the disposition itself.

The motion papers carry an outlandish confidence. Whether this holds outside New York is a question for counsel there. The docket rewards patience.

Terms That Require the Signed Agreement, and the Next Conversation

Nineteen further definitions live in the cited sources rather than here, and the gap is where signers lose. That is why this section names questions rather than answers. The daily collection rows, the performance framing beyond its label with the fee clause, the identification and proof with assignment and control refinements, the seven conduct and cooperation definitions in the federal order, and the motion burden with the contract and guaranty elements all await counsel walkthrough against the file.

No ACH or electronic debit language beyond a single capped authorization was captured. No filing authorization, notice of default, or cure period language was captured. Jury trial waiver, arbitration clause, forum selection, and power of attorney were absent, as were setoff, cross default, blanket lien language, and stacking.

A glossary earns its keep on a Friday afternoon in August, when counsel asks what a notice means and the owner must answer from the file. Ask what each paper requires, who must act, and what proof returns to the file. Most owners meet these terms for the first time under pressure, and I understand why the pages blur.

Delancey Street offers an initial discussion of business debt negotiation through its debt settlement service, while an attorney answers the claims made against the business. The company acts as a settlement company rather than a law firm. Bring the documents containing the terms that confuse, even the pages that embarrass. Ensure counsel sees the complete agreement with every attachment, and ensure the business keeps the closing records where the next reviewer can find them.

Resist the urge to sign a new paper before understanding the old one, even briefly weighing speed over comprehension. Simply ask what each obligation requires in plain terms. Protect and preserve the originals, for the file that defines its own terms needs no interpreter.