YARD Law Co. · Dispute Resolution & Enforcement · August 2026 · YARD Law Legal Team
Reviewed August 2026. Bulgarian order for payment proceedings changed substantially on 1 July 2025.
When a Bulgarian customer stops paying a foreign supplier, the first question is usually whether another demand letter will make a difference.
Sometimes it will. More often the important question is whether the debtor will still own anything by the time a judgment exists, and that question determines the sequence of everything else.
The unpaid amount is only part of the case. Before proceedings are started the commercial relationship has to be reconstructed: contract, orders, invoices, delivery documents, credit notes, bank transfers, correspondence, acknowledgements, partial payments and repayment proposals.
A strong recovery case is not a folder of invoices. It has to show why the money became due, what was actually supplied, whether the debtor disputed performance, and whether later conduct confirms the debt. Documents never drafted as legal instruments frequently decide these cases: an email proposing a repayment schedule, a partial payment, an accounting document referring back to the original invoice.
Check limitation at the same time. The general period under чл. 110 ЗЗД is five years. Claims for interest and other periodic payments fall under the shorter three year period in чл. 111 ЗЗД. A file that has been sitting in a foreign accounts department for four years needs that assessment before anything else is decided.
It depends on the contract, and the distinction is worth understanding because it affects when interest starts.
Where the contract fixes a date for payment, the debtor falls into default on that date without any further step (чл. 84, ал. 1 ЗЗД). Where no date has been fixed, the debtor is placed in default by an invitation to perform (чл. 84, ал. 2 ЗЗД). Interest for delay under чл. 86 ЗЗД follows from default, so on a contract with a fixed payment date interest has usually been running since long before anyone thought about writing a letter.
A demand still has uses: a final opportunity for voluntary payment, a further acknowledgement, and a demonstration of reasonableness before litigation. But it is not a universal precondition, and where the debtor's financial position is deteriorating, repeatedly warning it simply provides time to move assets. In that situation the sequence should be reversed: secure first, correspond afterwards.
Bulgarian procedure offers a document-based route that is not a full lawsuit: заповедно производство.
Since 1 July 2025 it runs electronically. Under чл. 409а ГПК the procedural steps and the court's acts in these proceedings are in electronic form, and applications are allocated centrally rather than simply lodged in paper with a particular local court.
For commercial creditors, electronic filing is now the rule rather than an option. Under чл. 410, ал. 5 ГПК, traders, the state and state institutions, municipalities, notaries and private enforcement officers, and persons represented by an advocate file applications for an order for payment only electronically, through the form available in the Unified Portal for Electronic Justice. Applicants outside those categories retain the paper option under чл. 410, ал. 6 ГПК, subject to the exceptions that provision sets out.
A foreign company pursuing a Bulgarian commercial debt through Bulgarian counsel is caught twice over: once as a trader, and again as a person represented by an advocate.
The practical consequence is that the description still found in most English-language material - post a paper application to the district court at the debtor's seat - no longer describes the procedure at all.
чл. 410 ГПК is not available for every commercial debt. This is the limit that matters most and it is regularly missed. The procedure applies to monetary claims where the underlying action falls within the subject-matter jurisdiction of the районен съд. Claims above the value threshold in чл. 104, т. 4 ГПК are heard at first instance by the окръжен съд and do not become чл. 410 claims because the debt happens to be evidenced by invoices.
For substantial commercial claims this may rule the procedure out at the outset.
чл. 417 ГПК is a different route with a different key. It allows an order and a writ of execution based on one of the categories of document the provision lists, and it applies to those documentary claims irrespective of the amount, so the районен съд threshold does not shut it out. But it depends entirely on holding a qualifying document. Ordinary invoices, delivery notes and email correspondence are not that, however persuasive they are as evidence.
If the debtor objects. The debtor may object without giving reasons within one month of service, and that period cannot be extended (чл. 414, ал. 2 ГПК). An objection does not require the debtor to prove anything. The creditor then has one month from the court's notice to bring the substantive claim (чл. 415 ГПК), and since July 2025 the court monitors that ex officio.
That is a detour rather than a wasted month. Where the claim is brought in time, it is treated as filed from the date of the original application (чл. 422 ГПК), so the original filing date is preserved, including for limitation purposes.
Before filing in Bulgaria at all, four things have to be checked.
There is also a European alternative to the Bulgarian order for payment, but it is narrower than it looks. Regulation (EC) 1896/2006 creates the European Order for Payment for cross border cases, and a cross border case is defined by reference to at least one party being domiciled or habitually resident in a Member State other than that of the court seised. A US, UK or other third country creditor suing a Bulgarian company in Bulgaria does not satisfy that definition. For qualifying intra-EU claims the instrument is worth comparing against the domestic route; otherwise it is not available on that basis.
Bulgarian procedure allows security for a claim already filed (чл. 389 ГПК) and for a claim not yet brought (чл. 390 ГПК), and there is a separate European instrument reaching bank accounts across Member States.
This is frequently the decision that determines whether a large claim is recoverable at all, and it is covered in detail on our page on freezing a Bulgarian debtor's assets before judgment. The point to take from here is only that it belongs at the beginning of the file, not after judgment.
A judgment does not collect money. If the debtor does not pay voluntarily, enforcement runs through a private or state enforcement officer and can target bank accounts, receivables from third parties, movable assets, real estate, corporate interests and other attachable property.
Under Regulation (EU) 1215/2012 a judgment given in one Member State is enforceable in another without a declaration of enforceability.
Where assets have already been moved - typically a transfer to a related party at a price bearing no relation to value - a creditor may seek to have the transaction declared ineffective as against it under чл. 135 ЗЗД. That is a separate claim with its own requirements, which differ depending on whether the disposal was for value and on what the transferee knew, and it has its own limitation position. It should be assessed as soon as the transfer is discovered.
The strategy changes and the deadlines become unforgiving.
Claims must be filed within one month of the entry in the Commercial Register of the decision opening insolvency proceedings (чл. 685, ал. 1 ТЗ). There is an additional period of not later than two months after that expires (чл. 688, ал. 1 ТЗ), but a creditor filing in the additional window is in a materially worse position, and after it closes claims arising before the opening cannot be filed at all. These are preclusive periods, not limitation periods.
Foreign creditors are better protected than many assume. Under Regulation (EU) 2015/848 the court or insolvency practitioner must immediately inform known foreign creditors individually, including of the deadlines and the consequences of missing them, and the period for lodging a claim may not be shorter than 30 days following publication.
The practical advice is nevertheless to monitor the Bulgarian register rather than wait for the notice, particularly where it is unclear whether the creditor has been identified as a known foreign creditor at all. A supplier whose contact details sit only in an accounts payable system may not be on the list the practitioner works from.
Security obtained before insolvency can remain highly relevant, but its effect has to be analysed in the insolvency context rather than assumed to survive intact.
A foreign creditor filing in Bulgaria will need its corporate documents and any power of attorney in a form the receiving procedure accepts. What that means differs by procedure: a court will accept a translation certified by the party under чл. 185 ГПК, while the Commercial Register applies a stricter rule. Authentication by Apostille or legalisation depends on the country of origin. We set this out in full in using foreign documents in Bulgaria.
This has a lead time and it should run in parallel with the evidence review, not after the decision to sue.
Not whether the claim can be brought, but what will be available to enforce against if it succeeds, and what has to be secured before the debtor knows it is coming.
We act for Bulgarian and international creditors in commercial recovery, interim security, enforcement and litigation and insolvency. For substantial claims our first step is normally an evidence and recovery assessment rather than immediately issuing proceedings.
To discuss a Bulgarian debtor, write to office@yardlaw.eu.
This article provides general information on Bulgarian procedure and EU instruments as at August 2026 and should not be relied upon as legal advice in a particular matter. Prepared by the legal team at YARD Law Co., a law firm based in Sofia, Bulgaria, acting for domestic and international clients in commercial disputes, enforcement and insolvency.
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