site.btaBulgaria Joins EU Court Case on Consumer Protection, Debt Collection

The Council of Ministers on Wednesday granted consent to Bulgaria joining a case instituted before the Court of Justice of the European Union on a request for a preliminary ruling lodged by the Sofia Regional Court.

In the pending Case C-672/25, the Bulgarian court asked the EU Court to interpret provisions of the Treaty of European Union, the Charter of Fundamental Rights and the Unfair Contract Terms Directive regarding order for payment proceedings (the commonest cases handled by Bulgarian courts, designed to quickly recover uncontested monetary debts without a full trial). The issues raised in the request concern key principles of the operation of the judicial system in particular and of the State in general, judicial review by the upper court, and the force of res judicata, as well as consumer rights, the right to effective remedy and the right to fair trial. 

Bulgaria proposes to the EU Court, if its finds the request admissible, to interpret EU law in a way ensuring a balance between the principles of effective consumer protection by the adjudicating body checking for unfair terms on its own initiative, legal certainty, and hearing one's case within a reasonable time.

By joining the case, Bulgaria seeks to contribute to the EU Court arriving at a conviction regarding the actual content of the law rules referred to in the request, the ultimate objective being to achieve a non-conflicting interpretation and exact application of EU law.