Abusive termination of contract by the bank
Judgement no. 15607/2012 of the Court of First Instance of Thessaloniki (interim proceedings) suspended the execution of an order for payment of a bank against a company selling medical products (our principal), of a total amount of 2.951.496€, since it found that the termination of the loan agreement between them was abusive, at a time when the credit limit had not been exceeded, no other order for payment had been issued against the creditor company and the bank’s claim, which ranged from about two-fifths of the credit limit, was fully secured by Greek government bonds. That decision held that the exercise of the bank’s rights vis-à-vis its credit-customers should be governed by the principles of good faith and fair practices (articles 178, 200, 288 of the Greek Civil Code), which impose – because of the nature of the credit relationship as a lasting relationship of particular trust between the contractual parties – the obligation to believe and protect the general interests of its customers in order to avoid any excessively burdensome consequences liable to cause harm to the creditor. Thus, in the event of difficulties in fulfilling the contractual commitments, due to the debtor’s financial weakness exceeding the limits of its strength, the fulfilment of the contractual commitments in good faith obligates the lending bank to tolerate a deviation from the agreed and reasonable delay, in particular in the case of a temporary failure and the claim for the performance of the contract results in its complete financial destruction…
