The General Judiciary Council has approved, by an agreement on May 25 2017, the specialisation of 54 courts (about one per province) to be responsible for dealing with court proceedings concerning floor clauses, mortgage expenses, delay interest, multi-currency, etc. and clauses of loans and credits, guaranteed with a mortgage, that means mortgages, where the borrower (client) is an individual and not a company.
Territorial competence: these courts will have exclusive jurisdiction to hear the affairs on the territory of the whole province, in relation to these clauses or general conditions. That is (for example for the province of Alicante) it will be only one court which must judge, all court cases about floor clauses, mortgage expenses, etc. of the entire province.
– Temporality: this exclusive competence, for the whole province, began in the month of June and will finish on December 31st 2017, although this period it may be extended.
In the province of Alicante (municipalities of Denia, Javea, Jalon, Alicante, Elche, Calpe, Orihuela, Torrevieja, etc.), the competent court is the first instance court number five-bis of the city of Alicante.
Although the idea is to speed up the handling of these court matters, everything indicates that it is very possible that there will be an avalanche of thousands of court claims presented in front of these specialised courts, so it is very possible that they would be overcharged with thousands of court cases and very important delays could take place…
What should be done by those affected by these types of clauses who are going to file a court claim?
It is very difficult to know what will happen, but there are two options:
- – Claim now before court number five of Alicante. This will mean that it will be a specialised court dealing with the case, but there may be a significant delay in the procedure and resolution of the court case.
- – Wait until January 2018, where it is foreseeable that it would be possible again to claim in front of the courts of your area (judicial party) – courts of Denia, Torrevieja, etc., depending on the domicile of the plaintiff or claimant.
In any case, the problem is the uncertainty, because the truth is:
- – It is not known if the specialised court will work well or not, whether it will be fast or slow, whether its criteria would be more or less favourable to the consumers, etc.
- – We also do not know if these specialised courts, as initially foreseen, will have exclusive jurisdiction only until December 31 or not, because it is possible that some people affected will decide to wait, but if the exclusive jurisdiction is extended beyond that date, the wait will not make any sense.
If you are in this situation, you need to consider this change of the court competence, and you will need to make a decision, contact us and we will help you.
The information provided in this article is not intended to be legal advice, but merely conveys general information related to legal issues.
Carlos Baos (Lawyer)
White & Baos
Tel:+34 966 426 185
E-mail: info@white-baos.com
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