Arrears
[ə'rɪəz] or [ə'rɪrz]
Definition
(noun.) an unpaid overdue debt.
(noun.) the state of being behind in payments; 'an account in arrears'.
Editor: Percival--From WordNet
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. pl. Arrearage, amounts due but unpaid.
Typed by Harley
Examples
- He was in arrears with his rent, it seems. Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- Miss Rugg, perhaps making up some of her arrears, likewise took very kindly to the mutton, and it rapidly diminished to the bone. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- There is a pile of these arrears very soon, and it swells like a rolling snowball. Charles Dickens. David Copperfield.
- But I should like you to tell me of another landlord who has distressed his tenants for arrears as little as I have. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- One of them in my room, Charles Gorot, had some arrears of work to make up, so I left him there and went out to dine. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
Checked by Andrew