July 2025

Decision of the Heraklion Single-Member Court of First Instance Annuls Enforcement Acts Based on Open Mutual Account Debt

Recently, judgment no. 876/2025 of the Single-Member Court of First Instance of Heraklion was issued, which annulled a payment order and an enforcement report for the compulsory auction of immovable property against our clients, concerning a debt arising from a credit agreement with an open mutual account in the amount of €1,300,000.

Specifically, the above decision upheld the relevant additional ground of our opposition, accepting the following: "From all the documents submitted by the parties, it is proven that, among the documents served on the appellants together with the impugned payment order, the foreign special purpose vehicle (SPV) named ……… appears to have acquired the disputed claim incorporated in payment order no. …………. issued by the Single-Member Court of First Instance of Heraklion, as the special successor of the banking institution named …………, in whose favor the payment order had been issued, pursuant to the sale and transfer agreement of business claims dated 25.05.2021 under Article 10(8) of Law 3156/2003. A summary of that agreement, bearing protocol no. 179/25.05.2021, was registered in the public registries provided under Article 3 of Law 2844/2000 at the Athens Pledge Registry, in volume 12, under entry no. 169. However, the summary of this agreement does not contain the mandatory information required by law for such registration. Specifically, the purchase price of the claims is not stated in the said summary but is merely referenced therein by referring to clause 8 of the full agreement dated 25.05.2021 for the transfer of business claims. According to the major premise set out in this judgment, such registration must comply with legal requirements, since, under Article 10(9) of Law 3156/2003, it constitutes an essential term for the validity of the agreement, given that it effectuates the transfer of the securitized claims, and pursuant to paragraph 10 of the same article, it also serves as notice to the debtor. Therefore, if such registration does not take place or is not compliant with legal requirements, the agreement is deemed incomplete and cannot produce its intended legal effects, namely the transfer of the claims—as is the case here, where the purchase price of the claims is not stated in the summary, but only referred to in the contract, the text of which (with the relevant terms) has not been submitted. Consequently, the transfer of the claim is incomplete and has not produced legal effects vis-à-vis the appellants, for whom such registration would serve as notice."