JOURNAL
Litigation in Germany
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Philipp Meier
Specialist lawyer for banking and capital market law
+49 (0)711 89 47 15 87
Legal Information
The german court system
The German jurisdiction is divided into the so-called „ordinary jurisdiction“ and various branches of public law. The ordinary courts include the civil courts and the criminal courts. Public law is decided by the administrative, financial and social courts. While the administrative courts are assigned a whole range of different areas of law, the tax courts only decide on tax law matters. The social courts also have the task of deciding alone on legal issues in the context of public services of general interest.
The civil courts
Private individuals and companies are most likely to come into contact with the civil courts, which deal with all issues of (international) civil law. These are often disputes that arise from various types of contractual relationships, for example impairment of performance in relation to a purchase or service contract, a rental agreement or a loan relationship. But the parties to a legal dispute are not always linked through a contractual relationship. Legal relationships to land are also often the cause of disputes of all kinds, and this is not always preceded by a real estate transaction. Instead, questions about neighborly law or legal positions that arise in connection with an inheritance need to be clarified.Local jurisdiction is usually the court of the judicial district in which the defendant lives or has his place of business. In this context, so-called jurisdiction agreements between the parties are possible, through which the legal dispute is assigned to a specific court for decision.
The first instance
In the first instance, all civil matters are dealt with by the local and regional courts. In most cases, the question of which of these two courts is to be appealed to is based on the so-called „litigious value“, i.e. the monetary value of the claim being pursued. If this is not more than 5,000 Euros, the local courts have jurisdiction; from a value in dispute of 5,001 Euros, the regional courts must be invoked. A single judge decides both in the local courts and in the regional courts. In some cases expressly regulated by the law, however, the matter must be negotiated before the regional court by the so-called chamber, i.e. by three judges. Even if the legal dispute has particular legal or factual difficulties or is of fundamental importance, the chambers of the regional courts will make a decision as to whether the case will be referred to a chamber decision. Since this is usually not the case, the majority of cases are also dealt with by the single judge before the regional courts. Furthermore, there are various special chambers at the regional courts, for example for commercial or construction matters, which have special expertise in their respective field of law.
Appeal and last resort
If the legal dispute is not ended in the first instance by a settlement or otherwise, both the local court and the regional court will decide by judgment. These first instance judgments are available for appeal if the subject of the complaint exceeds a value of 600 euros or – if this is not the case – the court of first instance has admitted the appeal. However, the review of the judgment by the appellate court is limited to specific doubts about the completeness and correctness of the factual findings by the first instance. It is all the more important to present the facts exhaustively in the first instance.The appeal against appeals judgments is possible, provided that the appellate court has admitted them or the competent appeal court accepts the appeal on the basis of a successful non-admission complaint. In the revision, however, only a legal review of the appeal judgment takes place. A renewed assessment of the facts with new evidence does not happen. If the appeal is successful, the contested decision is set aside and the matter is referred back to the court of appeal.
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