Background
Our client received a payment order from a former acquaintance who claimed there was "money agreed to be repaid for living expenses and payments made on your behalf during the time we lived together." Pressed by work, our client failed to object in time, and in the meantime the payment order became final, exposing our client to compulsory execution. Changchun represented our client (the plaintiff) in bringing an action for objection to claim.
The Issue — Can a Final Payment Order Still Be Contested?
Once a payment order becomes final it acquires executory force, but it does not carry res judicata as a final judgment does. Where the claim it asserts does not actually exist, the debtor can therefore block execution by an action for objection to claim (Civil Execution Act arts. 44 and 58(3)). The key question was whether an obligation to repay had ever been agreed at all.
How Changchun Helped
Changchun proved that the claim asserted in the payment order did not exist, pointing to ① the absence of any agreement by our client to pay the money, and ② the fact that the other party's separate criminal complaints against our client for theft, fraud and other offenses had all resulted in findings of no case to answer.
Outcome
The court accepted our client's arguments and disallowed compulsory execution under the final payment order. Our client was freed entirely from the risk of execution on a debt that never existed.
There is no need to give up simply because a payment order has become final. Where the claim does not actually exist, the execution itself can be stopped by an action for objection to claim. (Outcomes may differ depending on the facts of each matter.)