Katowice Court of Appeal order

dated 8 July 2021

Case No. V AGo 15/20

Summary by arbitraz.laszczuk.pl:

A joint-stock company based in Ż. filed a motion for enforcement of an arbitration award of 20 August 2020, account taken of the wording of the arbitral tribunal’s order of 24 September 2020. In the award, the arbitral tribunal, among other things, obliged a foreign company based in H. (Germany) to pay the joint-stock company approx. EUR 1,470,000 with interest for late payment and approx. PLN 140,000 for the costs of the arbitration proceedings.

The Court of Appeal in Katowice enforced the said arbitration award. The Court found that in the course of the arbitration proceedings the foreign company had not been deprived of the ability to defend its rights and the public policy clause had not been violated. It stressed that a failure to consider an allegation regarding a set-off cannot be qualified as deprivation of a party of its ability to defend itself due to the fact that the correctness of such an allegation is not subject to review in the enforcement clause proceedings.

It is worth noting than in this order the Court of Appeal in Katowice made a reference to the Polish Supreme Court judgment dated 13 December 2006, Case No. II CSK 289/06.

Excerpts from the text of the court ruling:

1. Deprivation of a party of the right to defend itself shall be understood strictly. A party is deprived of the ability to defend its rights, if an arbitral tribunal fails to hear the party at all or gives this party no opportunity to provide explanations and statements with reference to the claims of the opposing party… .

2. It is possible… to proceed simultaneously before a state court and an arbitral tribunal. However, if two different rulings have been rendered in the case – one by the arbitral tribunal and one by the state court, this shall be a basis for setting aside of the arbitration award pursuant to Art. 1206 § 1 point 6 of the PCPC.