Background
Legal developments
Comment
Historically, Belgian insolvency legislation has applied only to entities involved in commercial activities. However, recent jurisprudence and upcoming legislative changes will result in important amendments that are intended to broaden the scope of the existing legislation.
Introduction
Legal framework
Future developments
Practical guidelines and tips
Introduction
Suppliers are often surprised by their customers' insolvency and only at that moment discover that the goods that they delivered are unpaid.
The Belgian Act of 11 July 2013 on security over movables (the Security over Movables Act) will modernise Belgium's legislation in respect of security over movables. On 7 November 2016, a draft bill has been published postponing the entry into effect of the Security over Movables Act until 1 January 2018 at the latest. In addition to the postponement, the draft bill also fine-tunes certain technical aspects of the Security over Movables Act to achieve maximum legal certainty and practical usefulness.
Sedert 1 januari 2017 voorziet de wet uitdrukkelijk in een algemene mogelijkheid voor de Rijksdienst voor Sociale Zekerheid (“RSZ”) om onbetwiste geldschulden in te vorderen door middel van een dwangbevel.
Dit houdt in dat de RSZ zichzelf een uitvoerbare titel (een dwangbevel) kan verschaffen, zonder een omweg te maken via de arbeidsrechtbank.
De invordering via dwangbevel is mogelijk voor alle bijdragen, bijdrageopslagen, verwijlintresten en andere vergoedingen die aan de RSZ verschuldigd zouden zijn. Belangrijk is weliswaar dat het dient te gaan om schulden:
The liquidation in one single act is allowed in Belgium since 2012. The following formalities are strictly required:
Principle
In order to secure the protection of judicial reorganization, the debtor needs to attach to the petition for judicial reorganization a certain number of documents provided for in article 17 § 2 of the Law on the continuity of enterprises (LCE). If these documents are not attached to the petition, the LCE provides that the petition shall be deemed inadmissible.
Enactment
On 11 September the Belgian Act that introduces certain measures to restrict the activities of vulture funds (the “Act”) was published in the Belgian Official Journal.
Le 5 novembre 2013, la Commission européenne a rendu public son projet de lignes directrices relatives aux aides au sauvetage et à la restructuration des entreprises en difficulté et l’a soumis à une consultation publique qui prendra fin le 31 décembre 2013. Elles remplaceront début 2014 les lignes directrices actuelles, adoptées en 2004.
La proposition de la Commission est disponible sur le lien suivant.