LexisNexis ( October 26, 2018, 12:04 PM EDT) -- Under the rules of Article 9 of the UCC, an assignee of the borrower’s receivables has the right to notify the account debtor to make payments directly to the assignee. If a deflection notice is given and payments to the assignee have already been made, is the assignee required to return those payments to an account debtor who has an affirmative claim against the assignor, or is the account debtor only excused from making further payments to the assignee? That was the jackpot issue in a recent decision from South Carolina. The court ruled that the account debtor could raise the assignor’s misbehavior as a “shield” to making further payments, but not as a “sword” to recover payments already made....