Draft amendments to the Commerce Act (“Act”), published on the Ministry of Justice’s web page was adopted on first reading. the forthcoming amendments foresees that payments on commercial transactions have to take place within 30 days as of the receipt of an invoice. At present there is no obligation in the Act regarding timely payment and this is one of the reasons for the vast inter-company indebtedness.
This change will implement the requirements of Directive 2011/7/EU of the European Parliament and the Council from 16 February 2011. The introduction of a 30 day term for payment between the counterparties after the receipt of the invoice or other request for payment is envisaged to be introduced in the amendments. Under certain conditions, longer terms regarding the payment may be agreed. In accordance with Directive 2011/7/EC the draft law foresees the existence of two modes – the optional and the mandatory – depending on the type of the debtor. When the debtor of the commercial transaction is a principal of public procurement as provided by the Public Procurement Act, namely state institutions and public organizations, the parties of the transaction can not negotiate terms that deviate from rules in the new amendments. Beyond this hypothesis, these rules shall have optional nature and the framework within which the parties of the transaction may differ is given by the general rules of contract law or the so called by the directive “grossly unfair”.
