In short. Yes. For most business disputes an online consultation with a commercial lawyer works perfectly well, as long as your papers reach us before the call and not during it. Advocate B.K. Singh's team runs video consultations for owners, directors and in-house teams, in Delhi NCR and outside it, on recovery claims, contract fights and suits already filed. We can usually fix one within a few days. Faster, if a court deadline is running. Start by sending the contract, invoices, correspondence and any summons as one organised set.
Is this your situation?
- Your business doesn't run without you, and losing half a day to sit in a lawyer's waiting room isn't happening.
- You're based outside Delhi NCR, and the party you're fighting is here.
- A summons in a commercial suit arrived this morning. You need to know the deadline before the day's out.
- A buyer owes you money, and before any notice goes out you'd like to know what your options really are.
- One director is in Gurugram, another in Pune, a third in Dubai, and all three want to hear the advice together.
- You want a second opinion on a dispute without signing up for a full engagement just yet.
Does advice on a business dispute really work over video?
For most commercial disputes, yes. The advice depends on documents and dates, and both travel perfectly well by email. A recovery claim rests on purchase orders, invoices, the ledger and the correspondence. A defence rests on the plaint, the documents filed with it and the date of service. You and your lawyer don't need to share a room for any of that. What you do need is for the papers to be read before the call, not flicked through during it.
A good share of Advocate B.K. Singh's first consultations now happen on video. Some are with Gurugram clients who'd rather not spend two hours in traffic each way. Some are with factory owners in Bhiwadi or Sonipat. Others are with companies whose directors are scattered across cities. The call usually runs forty-five minutes to an hour. Most of the real work happens before it, when the papers are read and the questions written out. We cover the same disputes online as in the office: recovery, breach of contract, partnership and shareholder fights, injunctions and defending suits, all listed on our commercial court services page.
There are limits. We'll come to them. But if you're a business owner with a deadline running, an online consultation this week usually beats an office visit next month.
The first thing Advocate B.K. Singh looks for in your papers
A deadline that's already running. Miss one and the right is often lost for good. In a commercial suit, the written statement is due within 30 days of service of summons, and it can be stretched only up to 120 days, with costs. After that the right to file is gone, as the Supreme Court confirmed in SCG Contracts v. K.S. Chamankar (2019). In a summary suit under Order XXXVII, the defendant gets just 10 days to enter appearance, and then 10 days from the summons for judgment to ask for leave to defend. An appeal under Section 13 of the Commercial Courts Act has to be filed within 60 days.
So when your papers land in our inbox, the date of service is the first thing written on the file. We work it out from the envelope, the process server's report or your own note. Clients are often hazy about it. A video call is a good moment to pin it down.
With no deadline at risk, we move on to limitation for a claim (most money claims get three years under the Limitation Act, 1963), whether it's a commercial dispute of Rs 3 lakh or more, and which court has jurisdiction. Strategy comes after that. Not before.
What can happen entirely online, and what still needs paper or a visit
More than people expect. The first advice, a written note of your options, the legal notice, a reply to a notice you've received, checking a draft settlement, planning for Section 12A mediation, the first draft of a plaint or written statement: all of it can be done by email and video. You give instructions and confirm them in writing. Frankly, that's often clearer than an office chat nobody minuted.
Some things still need ink. Pleadings and affidavits have to be signed, and affidavits sworn before a notary or oath commissioner. You can do that in your own city and courier the originals. You'll have to sign the vakalatnama yourself. Originals may be needed for inspection under Order XI or at evidence. Some courts will want to see them.
And a few things go better face to face. A witness getting ready for cross-examination gains a lot from at least one long session across a table. A file with several hundred pages of construction drawings and measurement books is easier to work through on paper. If the fight is over whether a signature or document is genuine, someone has to look at the original. A scan won't do.
Getting ready for an online consultation with a commercial lawyer
Prepare well and an online consultation with a commercial lawyer can take half the time and give you twice the value. The single most useful document is a one-page chronology. Dates down the left, one line on what happened, and the paper that proves it. Owners who write one often remember things they'd forgotten. And we can read the whole dispute in five minutes.
Send a few PDFs grouped by type: the contract or purchase orders, invoices and delivery papers, the ledger, correspondence, and court papers if there are any. Give each file a clear name. Scan at a readable resolution, in page order. Please don't send forty separate phone photos of a forty-page agreement. If the ledger lives in Tally or other accounting software, send it as a spreadsheet too, so we can check the figures quickly.
For WhatsApp chats, use the app's export option instead of screenshots, because an export keeps the dates, the times and the whole thread. Hang on to the phone itself. Don't change it, and don't delete the chat. Last, write down the three questions you most want answered. It's very easy to spend an hour on background and run out of time for the one decision you actually came to make. For a fuller list, see our guide on the 12 documents to have ready for a meeting with a commercial court lawyer.
What makes an online consultation less useful
- Sending the summons but not the plaint. The summons gives you the deadline. The plaint and its documents give you the case, and without them any advice on your defence is a guess.
- Emailing papers ten minutes before the call. Nobody can read them properly in that time. Send them a day or two ahead.
- Cropping or editing screenshots. A chat image that's been touched up invites doubt later. Export the whole chat and leave the original alone.
- Joining from the car, or from the shop floor with machines running. Dropped calls and noise eat into your time. Find a quiet room and have the papers in front of you.
- Holding back the awkward documents. The email where you admitted a delay, or the complaint you never answered, matters more than anything else. The other side will produce it anyway.
- Putting the wrong person on the call. A director who never dealt with the customer can't answer questions about the facts. Bring whoever handled the account.
- Assuming the call means we've been engaged. A consultation is advice. Work on notices or filings starts only once the scope and fee are agreed in writing, and a vakalatnama is signed where it's needed.
Is what you share on a video call kept confidential?
Yes. Section 132 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, which replaced Section 126 of the Indian Evidence Act, protects communications between client and advocate made in the course of professional employment. The advocate can't disclose them without your consent. The exceptions are narrow, for instance communications made to further an illegal purpose. And the protection is the same whether you spoke in an office or on a video call.
Your own side is what you control. Join from somewhere private, not an open-plan office where your staff can hear every word. Send documents from a business email that only authorised people can open. Don't forward legal advice to the big office WhatsApp group, where it may end up with someone who later leaves on bad terms. And if the directors are fighting among themselves, be clear about whom we're advising. Advice given to one camp isn't common property.
We handle personal data you share in line with the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and the IT Act, 2000, and we use documents only for your matter. If something is especially sensitive, say a trade secret or a pricing formula, tell us before you send it. We'll handle it with the care it needs.
Is video advice as reliable as advice across a desk?
Advice is only as good as the documents behind it, wherever you get it. A video consultation advocate who has read your contract, ledger and correspondence beforehand will advise you better than an office meeting where the lawyer is turning the pages for the first time. Preparation matters far more than format.
Online advice goes wrong when it rests on what the client says instead of what the papers show. An owner says 'the contract has an arbitration clause' or 'we never got any complaint'. Either could be wrong. So in online consultations Advocate B.K. Singh separates, out loud, what he has seen in documents from what he has only been told, and says which parts of the advice would change if a missing document turned up. The written note after the call keeps the same line.
Sometimes the call shows the file needs a physical look, because originals have to be compared or a big pile of site records gone through. We'll say so plainly and fix an office meeting at Dwarka or Vaishali. The in-person route is covered in our guide on booking a consultation in Dwarka or Vaishali.
Who should consult online, and who's better off coming in
Online works for most small and mid-sized businesses with a recovery or contract dispute, where the file is a manageable stack of invoices, orders and emails. It works for startups whose founders live in different cities and are used to shared folders. In-house legal teams at bigger companies use it to get a quick view on forum or limitation before a board meeting. And it suits anyone outside Delhi NCR with a dispute here, which we cover in how Advocate B.K. Singh works with clients outside Delhi.
Coming in is better for some people. A first-time litigant who's anxious may want to see the faces handling the case. An elderly proprietor may simply not like video calls. And files where originals, samples or physical evidence matter belong in the office. Construction and infrastructure disputes, with their mountains of drawings and records, often fall in that last group.
Plenty of matters use both. First talk online, file built over email, one visit before signing the plaint or before evidence.
When people look up B.K. Singh online, they're often trying to work out, before committing to anything, whether their dispute is worth pursuing at all. That's a perfectly fair use of a first consultation. Sometimes the honest answer is that the amount is too small for what a suit costs. Or that limitation has run out on most of it. Or that a firm letter and a proper settlement document will achieve more than litigation. You're better off hearing that on a one-hour call than a year into a case.
You've just been sued. Can an online consultation help?
It's often the quickest way to protect yourself. Say summons in a commercial suit reaches you on a Monday. Send us the full papers that day and you can have a consultation within a day or two, which keeps the 30-day window for the written statement comfortably in hand. In a summary suit, where you've only 10 days to enter appearance, speed matters even more.
That first call is practical. Was the summons properly served, and when? Is the claim within limitation? Was Section 12A mediation tried, and if not, does the plaint justify skipping it? Do you have documents that answer the claim? Is there a counter-claim? Our guide on defending a commercial suit once summons arrives takes these one by one. The commercial suit defence page explains how we prepare the written statement and document disclosure.
In a summary suit, everything rides on the leave to defend application. It has to show a real defence backed by documents. And it's drafted with the clock running, which is exactly why papers sent on day one instead of day eight make such a visible difference to how good it turns out. Our leave to defend page explains how the court decides.
Where the case is filed, and how much of it can run online
Consulting online doesn't change where a case is filed. That's decided by Section 20 of the Code of Civil Procedure (where the defendant carries on business, or where the cause of action arose), by any valid jurisdiction clause, and by the value of the claim. In Delhi, commercial suits up to Rs 2 crore go to the District Judge (Commercial Court) in the district with territorial jurisdiction, and larger ones to the Commercial Division of the Delhi High Court. Check the current limit, because in July 2026 a proposal to raise it to Rs 10 crore was recommended. In Noida, Ghaziabad, Gurugram and Faridabad, the court designated as the district's Commercial Court hears these suits.
What has changed is how much of the case can run without anyone travelling. The Delhi High Court and the Delhi district courts take electronic filing, and the High Court has directed the district courts to allow hybrid hearings. You can often join Section 12A mediation sessions online too, though check with the legal services authority concerned. Our guide on e-filing a commercial suit in Delhi walks through the filing.
Evidence is still the stage most likely to need you there in person. Key witnesses are usually cross-examined in court. Courts can allow video evidence in suitable cases. It needs their permission.
You need an urgent court order, not just advice
Some disputes can't wait for a notice and three months of mediation. A distributor cut off without notice may be about to lose its stock. A former partner may be working through the firm's customer list. A buyer who owes Rs 70 lakh may be selling its only property. Then the question for the first consultation is whether the facts justify going straight to court for an interim order. An online meeting is often the fastest way to answer it.
Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act exempts a suit that contemplates urgent interim relief from pre-institution mediation. But in Yamini Manohar v. T.K.D. Keerthi (2023), the Supreme Court held that urgency is judged from the plaint and documents, and you can't dodge mediation just by tacking on a prayer for an injunction. So the consultation has to test whether the urgency is real and can be proved. Dates. Documents. What you'll lose if the court doesn't step in now.
If it is real, the remedies include a temporary injunction under Order XXXIX, attachment before judgment under Order XXXVIII Rule 5, or a receiver under Order XL. We can start drafting for urgent relief the day the papers arrive, with you approving drafts by email and signing affidavits where you are. Distance rarely slows these applications down. Missing documents do. Send the evidence of urgency first.
Booking and running an online consultation
This is how a first online consultation on a commercial dispute usually goes.
Get in touch and outline the dispute
Use the contact page or call us with a short description: who the parties are, how much is involved, and whether any court papers have arrived. We'll tell you when you book whether a consultation fee applies.
Send the papers
Email the chronology and grouped PDFs at least a day before the call. If summons has been served, put the date clearly at the top of your email.
We read before the call
We go through the papers, mark deadlines and limitation, and note questions about gaps in the documents.
The video call
Usually forty-five minutes to an hour. We confirm the facts, talk through the options, and give you a view on the route, the timing and costs like court fee and mediation.
Written follow-up
You get a short note with the advice, what we saw and what we assumed, the next step and any deadline.
Decide and engage
If you want us to act, the scope and professional fee are agreed in writing, stage by stage, and the vakalatnama and authorisations get signed.
Time and costs, from the first call to filing
| Stage | Usual time | Costs apart from the professional fee |
|---|---|---|
| Booking the consultation | A few days; quicker if a court deadline is running | Consultation fee, if any, explained when you book |
| Reading your papers before the call | 1 to 2 days ahead of the call | None |
| Video consultation and written note | One call of roughly an hour; the note follows within a few days | None |
| Legal notice and waiting for a reply | 15 to 30 days | Courier and postage |
| Section 12A mediation | Up to 3 months, plus 2 more if both sides agree | Small prescribed mediation fee; check what it is now |
| Plaint or written statement | Plaint 1 to 3 weeks after mediation; written statement within 30 days of service, 120 days at the outside | Court fee on a plaint, ad valorem under the state schedule; check the current schedule. Notary and courier |
| Hearings | For as long as the case runs, many of them hybrid | Travel only when you actually need to be there |
Before you join the call
- A one-page chronology, with dates and the document behind each event
- The contract, purchase orders or work orders, terms and conditions pages included
- Invoices, delivery challans, e-way bills or completion certificates
- The ledger, as a PDF and as a spreadsheet
- Correspondence in date order, with WhatsApp chats exported in full
- Any legal notices you sent or got, and the replies
- If you've been sued, the summons, the complete plaint with documents, and the date they reached you
- Your three main questions, written down
- Whoever handled the deal, free to join
- A quiet room, a charged laptop and a steady connection
An invented example: a Faridabad auto-parts supplier and a summary suit
This one is made up. A Faridabad auto components maker is served with a summary suit, filed in a Delhi commercial court by a steel trader claiming Rs 48 lakh. The summons reaches the factory on a Thursday. It sits with the security office over the weekend and lands on the owner's desk on Monday. He's never been sued before. He assumes he has a month.
He emails the plaint on Monday evening and is on a video call on Tuesday. The date gets settled first. The 10 days to enter appearance run from service at the factory, not from Monday, so several are already gone. Appearance is entered that week. On the same call the owner explains that two consignments were rejected for failing hardness tests, and he still has the lab reports and the emails sending them to the trader at the time.
By that evening the reports and emails are scanned and exported, and they become the spine of the application for leave to defend. Will leave be granted? On what terms? That's the court's call. What matters here is how the defence was built: from a factory office in Faridabad, with nobody making the drive to Delhi. And the one date that couldn't slip didn't.
Keeping what you send us usable in court
Look at what you actually send us. Emails, PDFs, chat exports, spreadsheets. Nearly all of it is electronic, and if the dispute reaches court each of those records has to be proved. The law on that is Section 63 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023. It asks for a certificate in the prescribed form that names the device or system the record came from and the person in charge of it.
So think about it from day one. Keep the phone or laptop that holds the original messages, and don't factory-reset it or hand it down to a nephew. Send chats to us directly, not via your manager, his assistant and the accounts clerk. A short, clean trail from device to courtroom gives the other side very little to attack. Our guide on proving emails and WhatsApp chats in a commercial court explains the certificate and the usual objections.
Want to consult online? Do this first
Write the one-page chronology and put the documents into grouped PDFs. If court papers have come, note the exact date and how they were served, and send the whole plaint, not just the summons. Decide who from your side will join the call. Write down the decisions you need help with. Our guide on what to bring to a first meeting with Advocate B.K. Singh applies just as much to an online meeting, and our overview of the commercial court cases we handle will show whether your dispute fits.
If the matter could end up in court, it helps to know how fees work before the call. That's covered in how fees are agreed with the team. To set up an online consultation and have your papers read beforehand, send them to Advocate B.K. Singh's team through our contact page.
Frequently asked questions
Which video platform do you use for online consultations?
Whatever suits you. Google Meet, Zoom or a WhatsApp video call are all fine. We send the link in advance, and if the connection drops we carry on over a normal phone call.
Can more than one director join the same online consultation?
Yes, from different cities if need be. That's one of the real advantages of meeting online. If the directors don't agree among themselves about the dispute, tell us beforehand so it's clear whom the advice is for.
Will I get the advice in writing after the call?
Usually, yes. We send a short note with the advice, the next step and any deadline. It also marks which points depend on documents we haven't seen yet.
Can I record the online consultation?
Ask at the start. In our view a written note is more useful than a recording. It states the advice precisely, and you can share it with your CA or your board.
Can I consult online in Hindi?
Of course. Lots of our consultations are in Hindi, or a mix of Hindi and English, whichever you're comfortable with. Pleadings in Delhi commercial courts are generally drafted in English, though.
What if I'm abroad and need advice on a dispute in Delhi?
It works the same way from abroad. Time zones are the only real issue. If documents need signing later, you can sign them before an Indian consulate, or before a local notary with an apostille.
Can the lawyer start work straight after an online consultation?
Yes, once scope and fee are agreed in writing. Urgent steps, like entering appearance in a summary suit, can be taken quickly after you sign and send the vakalatnama.
Is an online consultation enough to decide whether to settle?
Often it is, if we've read the key documents. The decision usually turns on how strong the papers are, whether the other side can pay and how long a case would take. All of that can be talked through on a call.
Advocate B.K. Singh
Founder of B.K. Singh & Associates. MCA, LL.B., LL.M. More than twenty years in practice before the Supreme Court, the Delhi High Court, district and commercial courts in Delhi NCR, and tribunals.
This guide explains the law in general terms and is not legal advice. For advice on your own papers, contact the team.