Litigation and arbitration

One of the reasons why our legal firm has gained the maximum respect and recognition throughout the years is because of its successful intervention in arbitration and litigation of great complexity and with notable economic impact.

We rely on professionals with extensive experience in civil, criminal and contentious-administrative law, who enable our clients to trust in the achievement of the best possible solution to their matters.

We assist and provide legal advice in court proceedings at every stage, including ordinary and extraordinary proceedings (appeal for reversal, procedural infringement, judicial review, legal protection), acting before the Court of First Instance, the Court of Appeal, the High Court of Justice of the Autonomous Communities, the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court.

However, as we are aware of the problems involved in court proceedings, we provide our clients with previous counselling in order to avoid to the extent possible the cost, of time and money, of court proceedings and, where necessary, to defend our clients’ rights and positions in the most favourable and substantiated possible way.

We act for our clients, advising them on matters which include:

· In the contractual area:
    ¤ Inefficacy, annulment, voidability and termination
    ¤ Simulated legal dealings
    ¤ Discharge of contracts due to failure to comply with obligations
    ¤ Contractual liability for failure to comply with obligations. Compensation for damages. Material and personal damage including moral damage
    ¤ Termination of obligations
    General contractual conditions. Unfair contractual terms. Paradigmatic examples in recent years: swaps or financial exchanges, mortgage floor, etc…
    ¤ Protection of consumers and users
    ¤ Application of criminal clauses
    ¤ Interpretation of contractual clauses

· In connection with sales purchase agreements:
    ¤ Promise to sale and effects of the same
    ¤ Defects in the consent of the parties
    ¤ Execution and validity of the agreement
    ¤ Resolutory conditions
    ¤ Vendor’s failure:
        · Default and excess of surface area
        · Aliud pro alio,
        · Aedilitian remedies (liable for remedy of hidden defects and warranties)
        · Delay in the delivery of the property
    ¤ Purchaser’s failure:
        · Lawsuits to claim unpaid price
        · Claim for real but not fair price
    ¤ Precedent and subsequent conditions. Retention of title and consequences of the same
    ¤ Termination for serious breach of contract
    ¤ Claim for damages due to the vendor’s or the purchaser’s failure to comply respectively with their obligations

· In relation to option to purchase agreements:
    ¤ Request for the option to purchase
    ¤ Expiry of the option to purchase

· In connection with loan agreements:
    ¤ Legal existence
    ¤ Unfair bank loan conditions. Lack of transparency and clarity
    ¤ Creditor’s obligations
    ¤ Borrower’s obligations:
        · Principal repayment
        · Payment of interests
        · Anatocism
        · Early loan maturity
        · Usurious practices

· In relation to the lease of real estate:
    ¤ Claim for outstanding rents
    ¤ Pre-emptive and redemption rights. Preferential right of purchase
    ¤ Requiring from the lessor the execution of the works necessary to maintain the real estate for the intended use.
    ¤ Requiring the lessee’s liability for inadequate use of the real estate
    ¤ Termination of contract:
        · Due to the expiration of the contract. Situations of tacit renewal
        · Renewals barring termination of contract
        · Abandonment and expiration in special circumstances
        · Termination of contract due to the lessee’s default::
                – Unauthorized transfer or sub-lease
                – Non-compliance with the payment of rents
                – Negligence in the maintenance of the real estate
        · Termination of contract due to the lessor’s default:
                – Breach of the right of enjoyment due to circumstances of fact or law
                – Failure to execute due repair works
                – Inadequacy of the real estate for the intended purpose
        · Loss of the real estate
        · Others
    ¤ Conclusion of precarious situations

· In connection with project lease agreements
    ¤ Construction defaults, ruinous defects and claims for liability for the guarantees set forth under the Building Standards Law
    ¤ Claims by the owner and/or developer against the construction company (due to wrong execution of works, or inadequate works or works not corresponding to that agreed, application of criminal clauses, compensation for late completion and delivery)
    ¤ Claims by the construction company against the owner or developer (right to receive the price, compensation for unilateral termination by the owner, right to receive the withholdings applied, …)
    ¤ Termination of contract (unilateral termination by the owner, supervening impossibility, …)

· In connection with guarantee agreements:
    ¤ Foreclosures and rights to pledge
    ¤ Enforcement of bonds and guarantees, guarantee enforceable upon first demand or first request
    ¤ Incidences in respect of the validity, effectiveness and enforceability of the guarantee agreement

· In connection with horizontal property:
    ¤ Claim of fees
    ¤ Challenge of shareholder’s meetings resolutions
    ¤ Claim for the fulfilment of the co-owners’ obligations
    ¤ Claim for the fulfilment of the community’s obligations
    ¤ Etc…

· Orders granting rights of ownership

· Protection of consumers and users:
    ¤ Nullity of general conditions
    ¤ Bank mistakes
    ¤ Misleading or false advertising (remote sales purchase, sales purchase executed outside commercial premises, off-plan sales purchases, misleading advertising of bank products, timesharing without fulfilment of the object, etc…)
    ¤ Manufacturing default, inadequate repairing, supply of defective goods and services causing damages
    ¤ Claim for guarantees and post-sale repair services
    ¤ Offering, contracting and executing holidays and combined tours

· Judicial division of estate:
    ¤ Distribution of estate
    ¤ Intervention of the remnant estate
    ¤ Administration of the body of the estate
    ¤ Settlement of marriage financial assets

· Claims for compensation for non-contractual civil liability (traffic accidents or related to other means of transport; manufacturer’s liability; State’s liability for actions carried out by civil servants or agents or for the operation of public services; company’s liability for actions performed by its employees; owner’s liability for falling trees, emission or explosion of substances stored in his/her property, fire, building destruction; animal owners’ liability: hunting grounds, traffic accidents, …; accidents suffered by individuals in public highways, public premises, entertainment venues, private buildings; damages to crops; medical and surgical liability;…)

· Protection of the right to honour, privacy and self-image

· In respect of companies:
    ¤ Company administrators’ liability: the individual action to claim liability, the strict or quasi-strict liability and the derivative action,
    ¤ Challenge of corporate agreements:
        · Null corporate agreements if they do not observe the law, either the Capital Company Act or any other mandatory or prohibitive rule (with legal status)
        · Voidable corporate agreements if they do not observe the by-laws or if they damage the society’s interests, for the benefit of one or various shareholders or third parties
        · Invalidity of shareholders’ meetings due to defaults in the notice of call or the constitution of the same
    ¤ Protection of shareholders’ political and economic rights (right to information, right to attendance, right to vote, pre-emptive subscription right, right to non-discrimination, right to the distribution of dividends in case of failure to distribute the same for unfair reasons, etc…)
    ¤ Etc…

· In the area of suit for collection of:
    ¤ Bills of exchange
    ¤ Promissory notes
    ¤ Cheques

· In the field of unfair competition, filing action for: declaratory judgement, discontinuance, prohibition, compensation for damages or enforcement of court judgment ordering conviction for enrichment:
    ¤ Acts of confusion
    ¤ Acts of deceit
    ¤ Delivery of gifts or advertising made by gifts, sales with premiums and similar situations such as unfair trade practices
    ¤ Slanderous acts by giving or disclosing statements on the activity of a third person in order to discredit said person
    ¤ Acts of comparison when it refers to extremes which are not analogous, relevant or verifiable
    ¤Avoidable acts of imitation leading to the association by consumers or the unfair exploitation of others’ reputation or effort. Systematic imitation of business services and competitors’ initiatives
    ¤ Unfair exploitation, either for their own benefit or that of others, of the advantages of the industrial, commercial or professional reputation acquired by a third party in the market
    ¤ Disclosure or exploitation, without the owner’s authorization, of industrial secrets or any other kind of business secrets
    ¤ Inducing employees, suppliers, clients or other parties subject to a contract, to infringe the basic contractual obligations agreed with competitors
    ¤ Infringement of regulations in respect of the competition (illegal obtention of advantages, contracting foreigners without authorization, etc…)
    ¤ Discriminatory treatment of consumers in respect of prices and other sales conditions; the exploitation by a business of the economic dependence relationship of their business clients or suppliers which have no other alternative; unfair disruption of business relationships
    ¤ Sales below cost