Editorial | Restructuring Directive  

Editorial | CEE

Reasoning behind the changes

In the two years that the "new" bankruptcy regime – the Bankruptcy Act of September 2015 (Stečajni zakon; the "BA") – has been in place, the number of pre-bankruptcy procedures initiated in Croatia has plummeted to only 273, with 58 restructuring plans being accepted. By comparison, under the previous pre-bankruptcy regime from 2012 to 2015, 8,262 pre-bankruptcy procedures were initiated, with 2,224 restructuring plans being reached.

After a lengthy consultation period, the Pre-Action Protocol for Debt Claims (PAPDC) has now been finalised and will come into force on 1 October 2017. This protocol will apply to lenders who are seeking payment of a debt from an individual/ sole trader, as a debtor or guarantor. Now is the time to update your systems and procedures to accommodate the new protocol requirements.

What is required?

The Ministry of Justice is consulting on a revised draft Pre-action Protocol for Debt Claims (Debt Protocol) after an earlier version was lambasted by representatives of the credit industry as being totally disproportionate. The new version attempts to strike a more proportionate balance between the needs of creditors, debtors and debt advisors.

The recently adopted Croatian Bankruptcy Act ("SZ")[1] sets out a new integrated pre-bankruptcy and bankruptcy regime. SZ has entirely replaced the previous bankruptcy act that was in force for 18 years, as well as provisions regulating pre-bankruptcy settlement proceedings prescribed under the Act on Financial Operations and Pre-bankruptcy Settlement