On July 1, 2024, the so-called "compulsory court mediation" was supposed to work, or to put it more clearly, the parties in some types of civil and commercial cases had to go through a mediation procedure before the actual court proceedings.

This idea caused serious controversy, especially in legal circles, long before the texts were published and submitted to public discussion. The result was that the persons involved in legal proceedings were divided, figuratively speaking, into "two camps" - for and against. I won't go into the arguments of either camp in detail, because anyone interested could find a lot of information on the subject, I will just note that this legislative change had its pros and cons…..Well, the cons prevailed. On the day that mandatory judicial mediation was supposed to work, the Constitutional Court declared it unconstitutional / at the request of the Supreme Bar Council/. This caused serious hysteria, since only at the beginning of June was the selection of the mediators to be assigned to the judicial centers. Everything seemed that our judicial system was ready to work according to the new texts of the Civil Procedure Code and the Law on Mediation.

Already on July 2, the media exploded with the news that Bulgaria was threatened with a sanction in the amount of BGN 100 million after the cancellation of the so-called "judicial mediation". The reason is that this reform is included as a measure in the second payment under the Recovery and Resilience Plan, and non-implementation could lead to a sanction for our country by the European Commission.

What's next?…….Broadly speaking -  new legislative changes amid an unstable political environment. What they will be, when they will be and whether the "compulsory court mediation" will work this time remains to be seen.

Until then, though, let's not forget that mediation is not cancelled! Out-of-court centers are operational and ready to assist in resolving your disputes.

We at Mediation Center "Europe" are available if you are looking for an alternative to a long legal battle.Our team of professionals will be there to support and advise you because we believe that:

 "THE FUTURE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE DISPUTE TODAY!"