July 2022

Interim Order of the Athens Court of First Instance on the Suspension of Performance of a Hotel Unit

On 6 July 2022, the Athens Court of First Instance issued a temporary injunction in favour of our client - a hotel management company. The latter granted a request for a temporary injunction for the reduction and batching of the amount of the guarantee, which had been ordered by a decision on interim measures, in order to suspend the immediate enforcement action against our client (hotel restitution) by a financial institution. In particular, the alleged debtor - our client applied for the revocation of an injunction decision because, inter alia, the latter was erroneous as: a) it ordered the one-off payment of an extremely large amount of 100. 000, without taking into account the lack of liquidity of the company at the beginning of the tourist season; b) ordered the payment of that amount directly to the opposing institution, bypassing the procedure provided for by the Code of Civil Procedure for the establishment of a guarantee through the Deposits and Loans Fund, which ensures the immediate return of the amount to the alleged debtor after the success of his legal remedies against enforcement; and c) did not set a time limit for the payment of the guarantee; and d) did not set a time limit for the payment of the guarantee, even though, in this case, there is talk of immediate enforcement (i.e. return of the lease of the business) and there is no subsequent act of enforcement (scheduled auction, etc.). (e.g. a scheduled execution of the contract) by which the alleged debtor could comply, leaving room for the creditor to set arbitrary deadlines, as was the case here. Indeed, the provisional judge perceived the above deficiencies and a) reduced the amount of the guarantee to €30,000 (i.e. by 70%), b) dosed it by setting three payment instalments and c) ordered the whole procedure to be followed through the Deposits and Loans Fund. It is worth noting here that the revocation of the injunction decision was requested without any new factual data after its issuance, but only because of its deficiencies (legal and factual), a procedural possibility which, according to Article 697 of the CCP, exists when the revocation is brought before the court where the main dispute is pending, as in the present case.