Act No 123/2008 Coll. amended the Code of Civil Procedure with effect from 1 July 2008, as part of the Ministry of Justice’s efforts to introduce electronic processes in Czech justice. According to the provision of Section 174a of the Code of Civil Procedure inserted by the amendment, it is possible to file an application for the issue of a payment order on an electronic form signed with the claimant’s guaranteed electronic signature, provided that the monetary performance required by the claimant does not exceed the amount of CZK 1,000,000. De facto, this is therefore not an electronic payment order, but “merely” an electronic application for the issue of a payment order.

Practically the same applies to an electronic payment order as applies to an “ordinary” payment order, namely in particular that it is at the court’s discretion whether to issue it or not, that it cannot be issued if the defendant’s whereabouts are unknown or if it is to be served on the defendant abroad, that it must be served on the defendant, or all defendants, personally, whereby the so-called fiction of service cannot be used. If the court does not issue an electronic payment order upon the claimant’s application, it shall automatically order a hearing. An electronic payment order against which an objection is not filed by the defendant, or at least one of the defendants, shall have the effects of a final judgment, just as applies to an “ordinary” payment order. If even just one of the defendants files a timely objection, the electronic payment order shall thereby be cancelled in its entirety and the court shall order a hearing. Anyone who does not wish to file an application for the issue of a payment order in electronic form or who does not have a guaranteed electronic signature may naturally file an application for the issue of an “ordinary” payment order in the same manner as has been possible until now. The court cannot issue an electronic payment order or an ordinary payment order if a right other than the right to payment of a monetary amount is asserted in the application. Thus, if the claimant were to seek, for example, refraining from certain conduct by means of an application for the issue of an electronic payment order, the court would reject that application.

From a practical point of view, it may be noted that a specimen form for an application for the issue of an electronic payment order was issued in the Annex to Decree of the Ministry of Justice No 197/2008 Coll. According to this decree, the specimen form should be published on the website of the Ministry of Justice.

It remains to be seen how the form will prove itself in practice. At first glance, it appears that it will not be complicated to complete it. In reality, however, situations will probably arise where, when completing the form, some columns will be missing and others will be superfluous. In our opinion, for example, the difference between the form columns “the claim concerns”, “circumstances invoked by the claimant” and “facts from which the right to payment of the monetary amount arises” is not entirely clear. It will depend on the specific court employees whether they will insist that the form be completed precisely according to their expectations, or whether they will be more lenient. An undisputed advantage is that the court fee for an application for the issue of an electronic payment order is half that of the court fee for an “ordinary” action or application for the issue of an “ordinary” payment order; it amounts to CZK 300 for an amount up to CZK 15,000, and for an amount exceeding CZK 15,000, it amounts to 2% of that amount. This should be one of the main motivating factors for the use of the electronic payment order institute in practice.

Mgr. Lucie Vaverková

This text was translated from Czech to English using an AI translator.