SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, 28 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) has completed the sanctioning file initiated against the College of Attorneys of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, in which a possible agreement contrary to the Law for the Defense of Competition was investigated.
This consisted of the obligation that the attorneys had to pay a fee of 50 euros per month for the use of the notification rooms and the transfer of judicial notifications through LexNET, the communication platform between the attorneys and the Administration of Justice.
In April 2021, the Canary Islands Service for the Defense of Competition (competent body for the investigation) initiated a disciplinary proceeding after the National Commission for Markets and Competition sent it a complaint from an individual.
In accordance with its Statutes, the College of Attorneys of Santa Cruz de Tenerife agreed to establish a fixed variable fee of 50 euros per month that the attorneys had to pay in that territory for making use of the service of the rooms for notification and transfer of judicial writs (platform LexNET), regardless of their place of registration.
According to the College itself, this fee was intended to defray the maintenance costs of the rooms and the costs of personnel, which were distributed indistinctly among the attorneys. In other words, a solicitor who made occasional or sporadic use of the room had to pay the same amount as one who made intensive use of it.
In this sense, the CNMC, like the Canary Islands Service for the Defense of Competition, considers that the agreement would not be equitable, since it would imply discrimination for access to the profession of court attorney based on economic capacity and without there being a norm that protects it.
BINDING COMMITMENTS
The College of Attorneys requested to finalize the sanctioning file by means of the conventional termination formula and presented to the CNMC a series of binding commitments that solve the competition problems detected.
Specifically, it undertakes that each attorney pays for the use of the LexNET platform based on each judicial proceeding. The amount will be calculated taking into account the average volume of telematic and printed notifications that each type of procedure usually generates and the delivery of documentation to the prosecutors of different courts.
The CNMC considers that the proposed methodology responds to objective criteria that are proportional to the service provided. Likewise, it allows checking the justification and transparency of future revisions.
