Mac's Poll - Let's Vote

norm de plume said:
Wednesday, April 2, 2014 @ 5:07 PM

I agree entirely with the comments. I'm a retired barrister with experience of both jurisdictions.

eggcup said:
Wednesday, April 2, 2014 @ 5:42 PM

There's no comparison. Whenever I've been cheated in Spain or had an injustice committed against me I've not gone near the legal system, because I know there's no point. The Diputacion de Granada widened the road adjoining our olive terraces and because they didn't support it and took away rock and trees, we had a massive landslide which wiped 10s of thousands of euros off its value. Our lawyer and architect both advised against any action because they said it would take years and even if we won, the Diputacion would never pay and we wouldn't be able to make them. You just have to stomach the loss.
In the UK we've used the legal system time and time again, for evictions, and also for when we've been ripped off by a holiday company and a mechanic. This week we're going to take Sky to the small claims court. There's a simple form to fill in on-line and to claim under £500, it costs £35. It's worth it just to see if Sky decide to pay a lawyer to defend it, costing them hundreds, or give us back the money they're owe us... It's easy-peasy in the UK.

gazdav said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 4:51 AM

The worst experiences of my life were in Spain my step son was killed in a traffic accident by an off duty Guardia officer who was speeding. To say there was a cover up and no due diligence would be an under statement. I wasn't even recognised or allowed to stand at the front of the court because I was a step-father and not a blood relative! The whole system was pathetic at best. On returning to the UK the UK police and UK coroner did more than the Spanish by far. Spain treats ex-pats like second class citizens at best. It's a corrupt country without recourse.. lets remember it wasn't that long ago Guardia officers were Francos henchmen.

Annie said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 8:29 AM

In my experience, the legal system in Spain is on the side of the "bad guys". If you want to fight an injustice, such as an illegal action by the Ayuntamiento or a tenant as but 2 examples, it costs a fortune. So that corruption can continue with impunity. Big organisations, such as the telephone and electricity companies, internet providers and banks, can run roughshod over anyone they like and it can take forever to get some kind of justice (if at all).

Spain is a great country in many respects until something goes wrong, which is thankfully rare. But if you are unfortunate enough, as I have been, to encounter problems then it is an exhausting and soul-destroying place in which to live. Bad enough for me to want to leave and that's a tragedy.

nsmisa said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 9:27 AM

Is this a serious question?

16k and 6 years to get a ruling, then 5 years later, still no money - Legal System??? It's a pathetic, corrupt, joke.

Kentgirl said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 9:38 AM

I have tried to use the services of three solicitors and I have had to get rid of the three of them as they were absolutely useless and working for the other side.

I was also taken to court by a man who was letting his dog defecate in our gardens and he later come and threatened me with a knife in court he told the judges I had hit him and although he had no marks whatsoever on him I was fined 100 euros for hitting him even I didnt! The law here is ridiculous, they courts are a laugh and law an ass.

chris s said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 10:03 AM

Just been through a 6 year long wait to bring Aifos to trial for stealing our deposit along with 14 other couples. They took our deposits and never built anything which unbelievably we lost, corrupt is the understatement, there is no comprehensible justice in Spain the only winners are the Lawyers. Total waste of time and money going to court here. Even more laughable in Malaga they have an incredible backlog but the courts only work in the mornings
Get a speeding fine don't pay (maybe you were not even aware of the fine ) and they are on your back immediately, something more criminal, manana, manana. The whole system needs to be publicly investigated at the highest level.

Janet White said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 10:26 AM

Well if the system for trying to get your 3% tax retention back is an example of the "law in action", heaven help you all ! We have been waiting 18 months for ours and our Gestoria who admittedly is not a solicitor as such is not only incompetent but a liar to boot ! Recently we were chasing her to find out why the huge delay, especially after we had found out from another company (British run) that they were getting their clients' money back after 2-3 mths and couldn't understand the hold up we were having. I put this to my Gestoria and instead of saying she would chase it up she provided me with 2 phone nos. to contact the Spanish Tax Office direct myself. As it turned out they were "premium" rate nos. and I couldn't get through on my cheap line no. and refused to pay the premium rate and went back to her to ask her to ring them as the other company told me they ring every Friday on behalf of their clients. She promptly forgot she had supplied us with 2 nos. and said the Tax Office didn't allow them to ring and query these cases so she could not contact them. I pointed out she had given me 2 nos. to use and she promptly changed tack and said they had one million cases like me and I would just have to wait my turn !! Bloody cheek, after we had paid her to get this money back. After again chasing it last week she got shirty again and then said she had received a letter from them which she attached saying the funds had been transferred on 10th March to our nominated bank account and asked me to check our bank account. When I said we checked our bank account every day and also my Spanish one just to check it hadn't been paid there, she said I needed to send bank statements to make an appeal to the Tax Office, otherwise they would do nothing. I did send them the same day but didn't even get the courtesy of an email confirming she had received them which upset me as I am loathe to send confidential info by email and wanted to be sure she had received them. How long does it take and what does it cost to send half a dozen words by email ?

I have lost all patience. The Spanish Tax Office have had an interest free loan from us for 18 months and we are still waiting ! I wouldn't blame anyone for not buying or selling property in Spain. My brother also has a villa to sell and is using her as I did not know then the trouble I would have so I will be telling him to switch his Power of Attorney to someone else when he has sold, in order to get his tax back.

I found the bureaucracy with anything, not just legal but anything to do with chasing up authorities, banks, anything an absolutely nightmare, so much so that I would never buy anything in Spain again and as the gentleman above said, it would stop me from wanting to live permanently in Spain. The stress is just too much to get anything done.

eggcup said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 10:53 AM

Well, all the comments seem to show there is a consensus that the Spanish legal system is rotten and useless and presumably as corrupt as the society as a whole. Yes the country is beautiful and many of the people are lovely but it's like the whole country is suffering from the disease of corruption and inefficiency.
Janet: if I were you I'd consider asking a lawyer to take over - our lawyer got us the 3% retention quite quickly as I recall, and she's based in Granada Province. If you want her details send me a private message. These things are very stressful.
Gazdav: how awful for you... obviously when a member of the family is unlawfully killed and you get no justice, that must be just unbearable. It's not just expats who are treated like that though. My neighbour's grandson was hanged in a cortijo in the countryside and the boys he was with had taken his sim card and car and driven to Madrid... and what did the Guardia do? Nada. They just accepted it was a suicide after asking some of the boys a couple of questions. And at the same time, just down the road from us, they allocate a load of their personnel to gathering money from fines for alleged traffic offences.
Zapatero's second-in-command (I forget her name) once said that corruption in Spain is their biggest threat to democracy; well, she could have added to that, that the lack of recourse to justice is equally damaging. It means that Spain is effectively almost a lawless society. I don't know what should be done, but Spain receive enough money from the European Union, so maybe they could put the pressure on, and at least get the courts to open all day instead of doing half-days. There should be high-level meetings going on, to try and tackle this crisis in the legal system, together with work on tackling the endemic corruption. But when the top dogs are implicated, where is the impetus going to come from?

crofter said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 11:30 AM

In my experience nobody in their right mind would buy a property in Spain. Apart from the usual incompetence and mishandling of anything to do with the government, local councils or anything official, including utilities its all hassle and stress that you can do without. Also their inheritance tax system is punitive to say the least, more ways of fleecing the people. Reside in Spain forget about it.

chris d said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 12:54 PM

I agree with chris s previous comment I took Aifos to court the same reason my court award was 95 000 euros plus interest that was also 5 years ago I gave them the money in 2003/2004 THE COURT CASE COST ME 7500 still not a euro back is this justice?

DarrenPollock said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 1:40 PM

The Spanish legal system is a joke. We fulfilled all our contract with Polaris World paying over £65k in deposits. They delayed starting, completion was 5 years after promised time, never sent Bank guarantees despite being asked over 40 times in writing, facilities were a fraction of what was promised yet the court ruled in their favour. It took us 5 years to get a court date yet Polaris had a date for a counter suit within 3 months. The appeal system is also a joke as it is too awkward to instigate. All this delay allowed Polaris to finish our apartment but still not the facilities. We have now been cheated out of our money so as far as I can see the Spanish legal system is geared towards looking after it's own large companies.

harddunby said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 2:06 PM

This really explains why the Spanish property and banking system collapsed so spectacularly . Why the Spanish Royal Family are involved in dubious loans from banks. This EU is led and has been since a plan was conceived in the 1970's to demoralise the indigenous peoples by a mass transfer of ethnic races from the Middle East and in Spain's case South America. What the planners have not considered is what to do when the immigrants to the EU start running the countries. To complain makes you a racist and therefore liable for prosecution.

nsmisa said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 2:07 PM

Chris D&S - my beef is also with Aifos (popular aren't they?).

I'm in for 123,000 euros according to the Malaga Court - doesn't seem to count for much I'm afraid?

Noe said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 2:39 PM

neilsophie@hotmail.com

neil said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 2:45 PM

The Legal system in Spain is the same as the Legal system in the uk.All the statutes are made by corupt poLIEticians who directly take their orders fromp large corporations.He who makes all the rules is obviously going to win every time.It is a fraud and it is not you who is involved in the Legal system but your fiction Legal or here in spain your persona fisica.Acts and statutes refer to them and not you.The only thing that you must obey is the law.All things Legal are contractual or civil.They can only be given the force of law by consent.You are tricked into giving this consent.A good free book on the subject is "Freedom is more than just a 7 letter word".You will discover why you never win in the Legal world.The system is,nt broken,it was designed this way.

belucky said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 2:53 PM

Bought property from AIFOS in 2004, which was never built. Took them to court in 2009 and "won", the Court ordered AIFOS to pay me 85,000 euros plus expenses and interest. I have never received a penny however with lawyers fees, embargos and other expenses, I am thousands of pounds out of pocket. The annoying part is that my original lawyer, who was worse than useless, regarding advice on the Bank Guarantees and the secure bank account etc. was paid up front. I now find that he is making more money by representing others, who like me have been cheated out of their savings etc. and are fighting for compensation. As far as I can make out it's a win win situation for lawyers, and a very lucrative money making game.

eggcup said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 5:16 PM

I'm just wondering about 'Keith,' who won his case for himself and others and was due to receive the money. Does anyone know if they actually have the money in their bank accounts now? And if so, I'd be asking him to help with a group action against this company, AIFOS - sorry, I don't know the case details. But the proof is in the pudding and I would definitely be asking him, as he has been supremely successful in getting the money back, it would seem.

nsmisa said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 5:39 PM

Aifos are in some kind of Court Administration, where they are protected from their Creditors - doubt they are paying anyone they don't have to? Be interested to her otherwise though!

Peter West said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 5:56 PM

Both the same. If there´s a polce officer involved, the process will be dishonest.

havinalaf said:
Saturday, April 5, 2014 @ 6:20 PM

On the property side my solicitor scuppered any attempt at me recovering considerable investment monies because of his dithering and attempts at increasing his own fees. I took the advice of another solicitor well known to this site and after she got all her fees I was no better off, and wasted a lot more time and energy. Perversely I ended up going back to the original solicitor who was very obviously in cahoots with the developer and determined to carve up my original investment between them. After about FIVE YEARS I eventually settled for a pittance just to be rid of the pathetic, greedy, corrupt, lying, disreputable bunch they all are.
Unbelievably they have the arrogance to become indignant if you question anything they do, despite the fact your paying ridiculous over-inflated fees for their NON-communication and NON-perrormance most of the time.
The system is as bad as the Mafia. They should be carrying violin cases or all wearing masks like their inquisitor ancestors!
The Brits are fair game to them and I'm sure the lawyers have a secret points system somewhere to see who can rip property owners off the most, with special prizes for those who manage to extrapolate the highest fees!!
Does anyone remember Kenny Everett? Do you remember what he suggested reference a field? Well thats what I suggest we do with them!!!

DarrenPollock said:
Sunday, April 6, 2014 @ 9:43 AM

I understand that all the judgements were given against aifos at least but in our case and that of numerous others the legal system ruled in favour of Polaris world even though they breached a number of Spanish laws and the contract was deemed abusive. Our solicitors were less than useless and only appeared interested in money which seems to be a common thread here.

Jamesinmadrid said:
Monday, April 7, 2014 @ 8:40 AM

If you can at all, dont take any risks or make any investment in Spain. Firstly, you cant trust any Spanish copmpany to build your house properly. The Spanish court system is rotten to the core. I have been told directly by many lawyers that bribing of judges is common place. Like previous posters have said, if the Spanish legal system actually want to go after you, you can be processed almost overnight, with way more speed than in the UK. However, this only happens when its in their interest. Spain is a beautiful country with many nice, kind people. But unfortunately, living here is a bit of a nightmare. If you are willing to put up with being conned and robbed by anyone you try to do a bit of business with, then you will get on fine. Also, if you can at all, dont use a Spanish bank. They literally take money from your account for no reason and make up excuses as to why. Its wild west stuff at times.

eggcup said:
Monday, April 7, 2014 @ 10:10 AM

Unfortunately everything James says is true. I didn't know about the bribing of judges being commonplace, but I've always been naive and I suppose it's obvious really.
We have a 22-year old Andaluz doing conversation classes with our children in Wales every week. It took him 6 months but he's just landed a proper job here - there's nothing for graduates in Spain now - all the money that could have been invested in the country for the future of the younger generation has gone into back pockets.
To see this young man so over the moon to have got this job in a care home is an experience that all young Spanish people should be having but they're instead put into a pit of despair. Our young Spanish friend thinks he will now put down permanent roots in the UK, and only visit Spain for holidays. You don't have to be an outsider in Spain, like us expats, to realise the dreadful mess the country is in; he sees it all too clearly. The causes are historical and deep-seated, but the Spanish don't like to look back at history and learn from it and use it as a way of going forward positively. What a mess.

mariadecastro said:
Monday, April 7, 2014 @ 4:23 PM

I agree with many of your comments and at the same time want to add that the Spanish government is working intensively on improving the quality and speed of Justice.

Of course, the financial crisis, of which we cannot blame any government made an impact on load of Courts.

I do hope and trust that the effort that the Government is making will bear fruits.

Cheers

Maria

PS.- You can read this related post if you like:
http://www.eyeonspain.com/blogs/costaluz/10942/Legal-tip-1000-Spanish-Courts-under-auditing.aspx

GreginLondon said:
Thursday, April 10, 2014 @ 3:44 PM

Test comment

DarrenPollock said:
Friday, April 11, 2014 @ 11:02 AM

I understand what you say Maria however in our case it took so many years for the Spanish legal system to hear our case it gave Polaris world time to finish some properties so that the judge ruled that law 57/68 did not apply any more. Our property was completed 3 years late. If our case had been heard in a proper time frame then it would have applied. I can only assume that the delays allowed by the Spanish legal system so the big firm would win.
The financial recession cannot possibly be blamed for corruption, lies and a legal system that appears to be weighted against ordinary decent people who had no recourse.
The fact that there are laws in place to protect consumers are worthless if the legal system is set up wrongly and the review is into something that should never have been so corrupt in the first place and is of no comfort to those of us who lost life savings by placing our trust in the Spanish system.

mariadecastro said:
Friday, April 11, 2014 @ 2:40 PM

I honestly need to state that the pro consumers results that are being obtained in many jurisdictions in Spain, when applying law 57/68 is something we are satisfied with.

Need to add, that Murcia Courts have been the most difficult ones in the fight for off plan consumers.

Dennis Gordon said:
Sunday, December 7, 2014 @ 9:13 PM

Hi All,
We managed to get our money back from Huma who were building the Almanzora country club we used a solicitor in Cadiz about as far away as we could get from Almanzora .
I believe we were lucky we said we did not want the 3000euro deposit or interest back this seemed to temp them, not ideal, but it did the trick. I really hope you all get your money back.

Could contacting your local MEP help, if you all got together as one voice?

Good Luck

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