We do not stop at the reminder.
Most accounting firms send three reminders and then hand the file back to you. We go all the way through the procedure: enforcement request, lifting of the objection, continuation, seizure or bankruptcy. In Switzerland and abroad.
Five steps, and most cases stop at the second.
A dated letter, with a figure and a deadline. It starts late-payment interest running and provides the evidence everything else depends on. Many cases unblock here, simply because the request stops being informal.
Filed with the debt enforcement office where the debtor lives or has its seat. The office serves a summons to pay. The debtor has twenty days to pay, and ten days to object. If no objection is raised, the way is open.
If the debtor objects, it must be lifted before a judge. Definitive when you hold a judgment or an authentic instrument; provisional when you hold a signed acknowledgement of debt. This is where the quality of your commercial paperwork pays off, one way or the other.
Once the objection is lifted or the deadline has passed, the request to continue restarts the office. It can be filed at the earliest twenty days after service, and at the latest one year after — past that, everything has to be started again.
Seizure of assets and income for an ordinary debtor; the bankruptcy route for an entity listed in the commercial register. At this stage the question is no longer legal but financial: what matters is what is left to seize.
The best collection is the one you never have to do.
Because we keep the books together with receivables and payables, we watch your invoices age in real time. An invoice chased at thirty days gets collected; the same one at two hundred days gets negotiated. The difference is not legal, it is organisational.
We also look at your terms and conditions, your payment wording and your proof of order. That is what decides, later, whether the objection is lifted provisionally or definitively.
My debtor has objected. Is that the end?
No. An objection suspends the proceedings, it does not cancel them. It must be lifted by a judge. If you hold a judgment or an authentic instrument, the lifting is definitive. If you hold a signed acknowledgement of debt — a contract, an explicit email, an accepted payment plan — it is provisional, and the debtor then has twenty days to bring an action to have the debt declared unenforceable.
How long do proceedings take?
With no objection, a few weeks to the seizure. With an objection, you must add the court delays for the lifting, which vary a great deal from canton to canton. The point to watch is not the duration but the one-year deadline to request the continuation.
And if the debtor is abroad?
Swiss enforcement requires a Swiss forum. Where there is none, you go through the debtor's own country, or through the instruments for recognition and enforcement of judgments. The group works across two countries and has a network beyond; tell us where your debtor is and we will tell you whether it is worth it.
What does an unsuccessful proceeding cost?
The office's fees, advanced by the creditor, and our hours. That is precisely why we look at solvency before starting, and why we tell you when a case is not worth pursuing. A certificate of unsatisfied claim is not a victory.
An invoice dragging on?
The amount, the date, and what documents you hold. With that we will tell you where you stand and what is still possible.