Opinion ID: 4777078
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The broad construction of “paid in full”

Text: Under the broad construction of “paid in full,” a surety’s full payment of the obligee’s claims against the debtor under a single secured contract, standing alone, does not constitute payment “in full.” Instead, to be “paid in full,” the obligee must have received full payment for all its claims against the debtor, including claims stemming from other contracts. See generally Hartford, 108 Fed. Cl. at 532 (explaining that “[t]he set-off right applies to government claims both under other contracts and under the same contract”). Here, the USPOC asserted that the Debtors had caused the United States to suffer losses not only on the NPCC Contract, but also on many other contracts (some of which were bonded by ICSP, while others were not). The undisputed facts establish that the United States was not paid in full on 18 those other contract claims before the Settlement Order was entered. Thus, under the broad construction, regardless of whether ICSP had made payment in full on its suretyship obligations for the NPCC Contract, the United States was not “paid in full” before the Settlement Order was entered.