Receiving an invoice does not always mean a surrogacy service instalment has become due. The agreed trigger, its occurrence and the relevant evidence need to be matched. Conversely, a missing document does not automatically justify stopping every payment. Isolate the disputed stage, reconstruct the timeline and seek a focused explanation. This guide concerns contractual payment analysis, not programme eligibility, parentage or the issue of a child’s travel document.
Legal support for this matter: Contract Disputes
1. Identify the precise payment trigger
Copy the particular instalment clause into a working note: amount, currency, event, payment period and referenced annex. “Programme start”, “completion of stage” and “receipt of confirmation” may describe different triggers. List multiple conditions separately. Sending an invoice may be an administrative step while time runs from receipt of a different document. Preserve that distinction in the Chinese working translation. A short commercial label cannot replace the full contractual wording.
Civil Code Articles 361 and 368 address timely performance and conditional obligations. Distinguish the day a demand was sent from the day the claimed payment obligation arose. Frame one testable question: was the second instalment payable before the specified certificate arrived? General dissatisfaction with the programme does not answer it. If the contract does not specify a particular certificate, do not present your preferred format as though both parties had already agreed to it.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
2. Reconstruct the operative agreement
Collect the signed agreement, annexes, schedule and later amendments. Retain the original quotation and advertisement separately: they supply context but do not automatically displace a later agreement. Date each version and identify its signatories. If website terms are invoked, locate the version made available when contracting. Printing today's page does not establish what the earlier terms were.
Check for separate contracts with an intermediary, agency and clinic. Do not carry a deadline from one into another without analysis. Describe a chat amendment accurately as a proposal, discussion or confirmed agreement. Who spoke, with what authority, and in response to which condition matters. Civil Code Articles 342–346 provide the framework for reviewing standard-term incorporation and ambiguity. Do not label an interpreter's brief explanation a signed annex, or omit a later amendment simply because the earlier schedule appears more favourable.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
3. Match evidence to the claimed event
Use four columns: contractual event, agency explanation, available evidence and outstanding question. Scheduling an appointment, holding it and delivering a report are different facts. An invitation may support the first without establishing the other two. Similarly, creation and delivery of a document differ where receipt starts the payment period. Recording that distinction is fact checking, not a predetermined finding of wrongdoing.
Civil Procedure Code Articles 102 and 105 concern proof and evaluation. Preserve material favourable to either side. If an attachment arrived but could not be opened, explain the technical problem and subsequent messages; “never received” may be incomplete. Request evidence sufficient for the specific event. Another person's complete medical history is often unnecessary to establish a billing date. A larger file is not automatically a stronger file, and irrelevant sensitive records can distract from the actual payment question.
Official sources: Civil Procedure Code of Georgia
4. Reconcile dates and bank stages
Record agreement, event, notice, attachment receipt, response and bank instruction. Georgia–China time differences matter for messages sent near midnight. Preserve the original timestamp and add a converted time separately. Check which calendar the contract uses for business days and the event from which counting begins. Keep a genuine ambiguity visible rather than silently adopting the most favourable answer.
Separate instruction of a transfer, bank execution and credit to the recipient. A screenshot may not establish all three. If the agreement requires receipt by a particular day, giving an earlier instruction may be insufficient. Ask the bank to explain a delay without assuming the deadline automatically extends. Retain both the bank explanation and any separately agreed extension from the provider: they establish different things. Also record whether an invoice was resent unchanged or actually replaced, because the second email date need not restart a contractual period.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
5. Analyse partial performance
In a hypothetical agreement, the second instalment follows delivery of a complete document package. Four of five items arrive; an outside organisation must issue the fifth. The question is not merely the percentage of work performed. Ask whether the whole package was the condition, whether items formed independent stages and who undertook to obtain the last document. Third-party delay does not have one universal effect across contracts.
Possible proposals include delivery of the missing item, an agreed partial payment or a revised date. These are options, not automatic rights. If paying part, identify the service covered and the unresolved issue. Otherwise the parties may later disagree about acceptance of the whole stage. Show the reviewer both interests: the value of completed work and the importance of the condition on which the schedule was planned. Avoid replacing that analysis with a general emotional judgment about the relationship.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
6. Assess withholding before acting
Article 369 requires particular care where one party agreed to perform in advance. A brief quotation does not permit every future payment to be stopped whenever dissatisfaction arises. An instalment may be an advance, a fee for completed work or a condition for a later service. Separate the disputed amount and timing from obligations you accept.
List practical consequences: a late-charge demand, suspension, a postponed stage or a termination notice. Each consequence's legal justification needs assessment, but its practical impact also matters. Organise continuity of essential services or child care separately; safe care arrangements should not await the billing outcome. A short written standstill can be proposed while evidence is checked. Define its scope and duration, and do not assume it exists merely because you requested it. If the other party refuses, reassess the exposure instead of treating silence or disagreement as consent.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
7. Write an answerable response
Identify the demand by number, sum, date and contract. State the disputed condition and request specific evidence. Combining every historical complaint in one letter can obscure the answerable question. If you want cooperation to continue, explain what information would let you decide payment. If you really need time to arrange money, request an extension honestly; that differs from claiming the trigger was not met.
Follow the contract's notice arrangements. A formal email may supplement a chat, but figures and dates should match. Preserve delivery evidence and the response. Your proposed reply period is not a universal statutory deadline. If the communication is intended as a notice to cure or a step toward withdrawal, obtain review of its content and service. Requirements relevant under Civil Code Article 405 cannot be met merely by adding “formal notice” to the heading. Know what legal function the letter is intended to perform before sending it.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
8. Check added late charges
The starting date for a penalty may depend on the disputed event itself. Request the formula, rate, period and principal. Check whether differently named charges duplicate one period. Arithmetic and legal entitlement are independent questions. A spreadsheet can be perfectly calculated while using an incorrect starting premise.
Civil Code Article 420 allows judicial reduction of a disproportionately high penalty. It does not automatically erase a charge or authorise the customer to impose a replacement amount. Hypothetically, a provider might calculate two weeks of delay while correspondence records an agreed ten-day extension. Preserve the agreement and show the alternative calculation. In negotiations separate principal, penalty and other demands, so agreement to pay the instalment is not casually described as acceptance of every addition. If a charge is called administration rather than a penalty, its label alone should not end the review of its contractual basis.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
9. Organise remote handling from China
Choose one contact and consistent file numbers for remote review from China. Parallel replies from relatives and interpreters can contradict one another. Decide who collects material, translates and may agree changes to money or deadlines. An instruction to translate is not itself authority to settle. Have material decisions confirmed clearly by the appropriate person.
Under Georgia's Private International Law framework, choice of law and jurisdiction are different questions. Living in China does not automatically place every dispute before a Chinese court. A Georgian-language contract does not resolve all conflicts issues either. Provide the parties' locations, chosen law and dispute-resolution provision. This Georgian contract analysis is not a general conclusion that surrogacy or a related transaction is lawful under Chinese law. A material Chinese-law question requires separate assessment, as does the use of any eventual decision in another country.
Official sources: Law of Georgia on Private International Law
10. Choose a proportionate next step
If trigger and evidence match, consider payment on the agreed timetable with an accurate reference. If the event is accepted but the sum is wrong, ask for a corrected invoice. If the event itself is disputed, identify the missing fact and proof. If wording supports competing readings, prepare both and their supporting material. These are response paths, not substitutes for a legal conclusion.
Wanting to leave the relationship does not automatically create a full-refund right. Examine termination, notices and completed services; refund valuation requires a different accounting exercise. Identify the responsible party, because the actual recipient of money and contractual debtor may differ. Plan a coherent sequence so the next letter does not contradict the last. Where a deadline is close, prioritise a timely, accurate statement of position rather than attempting to settle every possible future issue in one response.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia · Civil Procedure Code of Georgia
11. Clarify future milestones
For each remaining stage, specify the deliverable, confirmation, sender and delivery address. Agree what happens when email bounces or an attachment cannot be read. Appropriate authorised people should approve amendments; a customer's private spreadsheet does not amend a contract. Say whether a change applies only to future stages. Resolution of the old dispute can be documented separately.
For example, the parties might require a brief completion confirmation with every invoice and acknowledgement through specified email accounts. That is an administrative arrangement, not a promise of a medical outcome or government document. Compare language versions for identical conditions, periods and exceptions. Do not unintentionally attach a release of historic claims to adoption of the new schedule. If the discussion concerns only future administration, a sentence settling every past relationship may have a much wider effect than the parties intended.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
12. Check whether a repeated stage creates another payment
Repeating an activity does not invariably create another instalment. Check whether the schedule describes one particular service, a fee for each occurrence or a once-only payment across the contract. Repeating a cost and repeating a contractual milestone are different questions. If a second invoice arrives, ask for the provision creating the new payment and an explanation of what happens to money paid against the first. Clinical necessity is outside this financial review.
Suppose a document-review stage carries one fee, and the organisation reviews the file again after a missing annex arrives. That second review might complete the original work or constitute a separately agreed instruction. The text and facts decide the analysis. Locate the new order, any first-stage completion confirmation and the original payment reference. Show the financial effect of each interpretation separately. Calling a demand a second instalment does not itself prove cancellation or full credit of the first. If the parties restart the schedule, the amendment should explain the treatment of historic payments so the apparent reset does not conceal another dispute about the balance.
Official sources: Civil Code of Georgia
13. Prepare a useful review bundle
Put the disputed sum, next demanded date and desired outcome on the first page. Add the main contract, relevant annex, invoice and timeline. Archive complete messages but refer to relevant file numbers in the overview. Context remains available and the immediate question is easy to find. Mark missing pages and unclear signatures; do not quietly substitute pages from another version to make the bundle appear complete.
For an initial public enquiry, state the service, disputed stage and deadline. Do not upload a child's passport, genetic information or another person's medical records to a public form. Ask Advokato to review the specific instalment and proposed response, then agree an appropriate document-transfer method. Source checking is not a completed assessment of an individual case. Even a strong payment position cannot determine registration, nationality or travel outcomes, which involve separate facts, powers and procedures.
Official sources: Civil Procedure Code of Georgia
Important noteThis material is general information, not personalised legal advice. Recheck current law, official practice, fees and deadlines against your facts before acting.