Also known as: fixed amount of money · determinable amount of money · sum certain · liquidated sum
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A monetary obligation whose exact value is stated explicitly or can be calculated using a fixed formula or data without requiring judicial discretion or additional fact-finding.
Fulton Shipping sued Fisher Foods for unpaid invoices totaling $142,000 under a supply contract. Fisher Foods failed to appear after proper service. Fulton Shipping submitted an affidavit listing the exact invoice amounts and requested clerk entry of judgment. Because the claimed sum was fixed by the invoices and required only arithmetic addition, the clerk entered default judgment for that amount plus costs.
Felipe Figueroa signed a promissory note promising to pay Foxfire Biotech exactly $75,000 plus interest at the prime rate published on the first business day of each month. Foxfire Biotech transferred the note to Franklin Foundry. Because the principal was stated as a fixed sum and the interest rate was determinable by reference to an external index, the note satisfied the fixed-amount requirement for negotiability.
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The clerk may enter judgment when the claim is for a sum certain or one that can be made certain by computation, the defendant has defaulted for failure to appear, and the defendant is neither a minor nor incompetent. An affidavit showing the amount due must accompany the request. If the amount requires fact-finding or discretion, the matter must go to the court under Rule 55(b)(2).
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No. The amount must be fixed or determinable. An instruction that states a specific sum plus interest computed by a stated formula satisfies the requirement even if the final figure is not written out at the time of issuance.
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Both standards exclude amounts that require judicial discretion or extrinsic fact-finding. An amount that can be calculated by applying a formula or reference data without further evidence meets either test.
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