GREECE Law and Practice Contributed by: Vassilios Moussas, Charalampos Kondis, Christina Grigoriadou and Konstantina Margariti, Moussas & Partners
• ordinary proceedings pending before the single-member court of first instance for disputes exceeding EUR30,000 or before the multi-member court of first instance (for lawsuits filed after 1 July 2020), as per Article 74 (14) of Law 4690/2020; and • all disputes arising from agreements that include an explicit mediation clause. The written notification by the mediator to the parties to hold the initial mediation session sus- pends the statutory limitation (and relating dead- lines) of the claim. In cases of non-compliance with the above mandatory initial mediation ses - sion, the hearing of the respective claims shall be rejected as inadmissible by the competent courts. All disputes in which the Greek state (or any pub- lic entity/organisation) is one of the parties are excluded from the mandatory preliminary media- tion session (art. 6, par. 3 of Law 4640/2019). For this type of disputes, Law 5108/2024 has further abolished the requirement for attorneys to inform their clients about the option of media- tion and the respective procedural consequence (dismissal of the hearing of the case as inadmis- sible) (art. 3, par. 3 of Law 4640/2019). State Fee Law 4640/2019 provides a significant cost for initially resorting to the courts, namely a state fee ( dikastiko ensimo ) for all disputes falling under the jurisdiction of multi-member courts of first instance with hearing dates from 1 January 2020 onwards, including lawsuits requesting only a declaratory judgment. Under the previously applicable regime this fee could be avoided if a lawsuit requested a declaratory judgment only; however, this option has now been abolished.
Although the above-mentioned law has received criticism from the legal community, case law seems to be divided on this specific issue since both approaches have been upheld. There are courts, which have ruled on the lack of consti- tutionality of this provision (namely Article 42 of Law 4640/2019), whereas on the other hand, the opposite approach has also been adopted by judgments ruling in favour of the compatibility of this provision with the Constitution. As per existing case law (Judgment no. 538/2019 of the Supreme Court and judgment no. 1425/2021 of Thessaloniki Three-Member Court of Appeal) it has been held that it is per- missible to file the state fee for the first time In principle, there are no pre-action requirements (eg, pre-action protocols, letters of claim, or pre- action notices) that parties need to meet prior to the commencement of proceedings. It is com- mon for the parties to serve extrajudicial letters prior to the initiation of the trial, assessing the possibility of prior resolution or settlement of the dispute. In special proceedings (indicatively, the order for the delivery of a leased property), however, service of an extrajudicial letter is required as a pre-trial step. See 7.1 Trial Proceedings for the two basic procedures. 3.2 Statutes of Limitations The Greek Civil Code provides for a 20-year gen- eral statute of limitations from the occurrence of the unlawful act. However, shorter periods are provided for particular types of disputes. Indica- tively, a five-year period is provided for commer- cial (or similar) business claims between profes- sionals, starting at the end of the year in which before a second instance court. Other Pre-action Requirements
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