Your rights
The service provider is obliged to ensure that the service is free from defects at the time of acceptance. They may offer a voluntary guarantee, in which case they guarantee that the service will retain the agreed characteristics during the guarantee period.
The service provider is obliged to provide services of average quality, unless the parties have agreed otherwise. In other words: the service should meet a standard level of quality. An average service provider cannot be expected to deliver top-class performance without a prior agreement.
The trader must draw up a record of the complaint. They must decide as soon as possible, but no later than within three days, and the defect must be rectified no later than 30 days after the complaint is submitted.
The customer has the right to withdraw from the service contract within 14 days without giving any reason. However, this applies only if the contract was concluded via the internet, by telephone or outside of standard business premises, for example at a trade fair or during a sales event. If the service provider has commenced the provision of the service with the customer’s express consent prior to the withdrawal, they are entitled to claim a reasonable portion of the agreed price for the service provided up to the point of withdrawal.
In certain cases, provided for by law, however, withdrawal from the contract is not possible, for example if the service has been fully performed with the customer’s express consent before the expiry of the withdrawal period. Another case concerns repairs or maintenance carried out at a location specified by the consumer at their request. However, if the work has been performed defectively, the contract may of course be terminated on the grounds of a material breach of contract.
Your obligations
Any defect in the service must be reported by the customer immediately upon discovery.
There is always a specific time limit for claiming defects, which is usually six months from the date the service was provided. In some cases, however, the time limit may be longer or shorter (some examples can be found in the main text).
The previous two parts of this series dealt with complaints about goods, but of course complaints can also be made about various services. If the food in a restaurant is spoiled, you do not have to pay for it. As always, however, it is worth trying to reach an amicable settlement first. Often, these are minor issues that hardly anyone would want to take to court over.
A service is, in principle, any commercial activity offered to and provided for consumers. Typical examples include a haircut at a hairdresser’s, a trip to the seaside, dinner at a restaurant, but also a bus journey or the provision of telecommunications services.
In the previous parts of this series, we looked at situations where a customer buys consumer goods, whether in a shop or by other means. In such cases, the solution is relatively straightforward from a legal perspective.
When it comes to services, however, it is important to know that there are no uniform rules governing complaints. There is a wide range of contract types, ranging from contracts for work and services to specific transport contracts. “When making a complaint about services, the rules are generally similar to those that apply, for example, to the manufacture of a custom-made item,” explains Filip Melzer, an expert in civil law at the Faculty of Law in Olomouc. This is based on the general provisions of the Civil Code, whilst details are additionally governed by certain special laws. For example, internet access is subject to the Electronic Communications Act.
No leniency for negligence
Anyone providing a service for a fee must provide it free of defects and in such a way that it complies with the agreement or customary standards. If everything is not in order, the customer is entitled to so-called rights arising from defective performance. A defect lies in any deviation between the agreed service and the service actually provided. If, for example, an internet connection has a speed of only 2 megabits instead of the agreed 20 megabits, this is clearly a defect.
The service must be provided to a standard level of quality, unless otherwise agreed. So if you visit a standard hairdressing salon, you cannot complain after your haircut that the result does not match that of a luxury salon you visited previously. The service should simply meet the usual standards.
You should be careful when choosing a service provider. This is because if a defect is already apparent and obvious at the time the contract is concluded, this is at the customer’s expense. If, for example, the hairdresser is clearly intoxicated and unable to form a coherent sentence, the customer should not be surprised if their hair subsequently looks as if it had been cut with a brush cutterinstead of scissors and clippers.
For, as always, the principle formulated by lawyer Vojtěch Steininger applies: “Consumer protection must not be understood as a justification for the consumer’s incompetence or recklessness.”
Different services – different time limits
There is no two-year guarantee for services, as there is when purchasing goods. As a rule, there is a six-month right to make a complaint.
In some cases, the period is longer, for example for services provided by car dealerships or dry cleaners, where items are repaired or processed under a contract for work and services. In such cases, the complaint period is two years, although only defects that already existed at the time of handover can be claimed. In contrast, a holiday can only be complained about within one month of returning, i.e. after the trip has ended. If, on the other hand, you wish to dispute your telephone provider’s bill, you have two months from the date of issue to do so. This illustrates just how varied the rules for making complaints about services can be.
The service provider may, of course, offer a quality guarantee, i.e. an assurance that the subject of the service will retain the agreed characteristics for a specific period. In practice, this amounts to a more comprehensive or longer guarantee than that required by law. For example, some transport companies offer discounts or refund the amount paid in the event of delays.
The procedure for making a complaint is very similar to that for the purchase of goods. The defect must be reported immediately, usually at the place where the service was provided. However, it is also possible to use various forms or to report the defect by telephone. A record is always made of every complaint. A decision on the complaint should be made as soon as possible, but no later than within three days, and it must be dealt with, including the rectification of the defects, within thirty days. If the defect can be rectified, a repair may be requested or, where appropriate, a reasonable price reduction demanded. The latter option is also available if the defect cannot be rectified – in this case, one may also withdraw from the contract and claim a refund of the amount paid.
Filip Melzer illustrates this using the example of a restaurant: “From a legal perspective, the decisive factor is whether there has been a material breach of contract. If this is the case – for instance, if the food served is spoiled – the guest has the right to withdraw from the contract. However, if it is merely a case of the steak needing to be cooked a little longer, this constitutes only a minor breach of contract and the restaurateur can decide whether to cook the steak a little longer or serve a new one. Should I suffer health problems as a result of the spoiled food, I can of course claim compensation for the damage incurred.”
In some cases, however, the customer has the option of demanding that a service provider’s mistake be rectified by someone else. “For example, you do not have to demand that a hairdresser who has proved incompetent fix the haircut. I can go to another hairdressing salon of a comparable standard and subsequently demand reimbursement from the original hairdresser,” explains Melzer.
If the complaint is rejected, the dispute can initially be resolved out of court by the Czech Trade Inspection Authority. As a last resort, you can then file a lawsuit in court.
I need money for the flat – can you lend me some?
If you lend someone money or another fungible item (e.g., grain, coal) for a specific period, this constitutes a loan agreement in legal terms. The new Civil Code has brought about a change in terminology and establishes three legal concepts with similar content and similar names, which can be somewhat confusing.
The first new development is the so-called loan for use, i.e. a situation in which an item is made available to another person for use free of charge, without a contract term or the purpose of use having been agreed. Return of the item may be demanded at any time. This is the explicit legal codification of an everyday situation, such as when you lend a circular saw to someone at a cabin that you do not currently need because you do not visit the cabin in winter.
Another change is the renaming of the previous loan agreement to a loan for use agreement. The third legal concept – a monetary loan – has remained essentially unchanged. It describes the transfer of a non-consumable item to another person for their use. Key features of the loan are that it is provided free of charge and that the item is transferred temporarily for a specific purpose.
Better in writing
So much for the terminology. The following deals exclusively with loans, which generally refers to money. The contract only comes into effect upon the handover of the item, for example through the transfer of money to an account. This distinguishes it from a similar credit agreement, which takes effect at the moment of conclusion. The bank is then obliged to provide the agreed funds, whilst the customer is obliged in return to accept them and repay them at the agreed time together with interest.
Although the law does not require a loan agreement to be in writing, this is certainly advisable. Whilst a verbal agreement is valid, the parties can quickly find themselves in a situation where evidence is lacking in the event of a dispute. The debtor may claim not to have received any money, whilst the creditor, conversely, may insist that they provided more than was actually the case. It is therefore advisable to draw up a written contract (LN subscribers can find a general template in the digital reader – Ed.), in which the purpose of the loan, the term and, where applicable, the amount and number of instalments, as well as the contractual interest rate, are clearly set out. Ideally, the contract should bear notarised signatures.
Unless the contract specifies when the loan is to be repaid, the due date is determined by the termination of the contract. Unless otherwise agreed, the debtor must repay the loan within six weeks.
How can repayment be ensured?
If the debtor fails to pay their debt properly and on time, they are in default. The creditor should prepare for this eventuality when drafting the contract and include an appropriate safeguard in the contract.
The first option is default interest, the rate of which can be agreed in the contract. If this is not the case, the default interest rate set out in the government regulation is deemed to have been agreed – currently, the annual interest rate is 8.05 per cent (the ČNB repo rate plus eight percentage points). Another option is a contractual penalty, which increases the debt in the event of late payment. This is a frequently used instrument, but care must be taken to ensure that it is proportionate to the subject matter of the contract. If, for example, failure to settle a debt of €1,000 on time were to result in a contractual penalty twenty times the amount of the debt, this would likely not stand up in court.
Another option is to secure a debt, whereby the creditor can claim the debt from another person in the event of non-repayment – typically this takes the form of a guarantee, where a third party ‘steps in’ for the debtor in the event of late payment. Often, a liability is also secured by a promissory note.
Compiled using information from the online advice service of dTest magazine.