The judgement of the Tallinn Circuit Court, which terminated the legal dispute of Andres Sõnajalg with SEB Bank, entered into force at the start of January and resolved the case finally in favour of Sõnajalg.
Sõnajalg explained that the dispute was about a private loan taken almost 15 years ago and the bank's attempts to obstruct the repayment of this loan during a certain period. "Ten years ago, the bank found a suitable opportunity to seize Andres Sõnajalg's bank accounts due to an earlier legal dispute, making it impossible for him to transfer his mortgage loan repayments. The bank also refused to accept my loan repayments in cash," said Sõnajalg.
The bank then terminated his mortgage loan agreement and demanded immediate repayment of the entire loan, claiming that Sõnajalg's loan was in arrears. Sõnajalg claims that he did not agree with this and took the matter to court, requesting that the court ascertain the validity of the loan agreement and his right to repay the loan on the basis of the payment schedule set out in the agreement instead of having to repay it as a lump sum.
Sõnajalg says that the court agreed with him and found that the bank itself made the repayment of the loan impossible and that in a situation like this, the bank had no right to decide that Sõnajalg was in breach of agreement and to terminate its agreement with him.
"I am pleased that the Estonian court system has ascertained the truth and justice has been done. Although this ruling does not change much in my life as I repaid the loan to the bank a long time ago, I believe that this is a positive message to many Estonians, who feel that banks have been way too harsh with them," he added.
"I dare to believe that this is also a pretty direct message to the former Ühispank, whose client I used to be, that they should not try to use such seemingly correct schemes in their client communication and should focus on finding fair solutions to every situation instead," added Sõnajalg.
ERR reports that the Circuit Court decided to annul the ruling made by the County Court due to incorrect implementation of the provisions of material and procedural law. The court ordered the defendant to pay 85 per cent of the plaintiff's procedural expenses and the plaintiff to pay 15 per cent of the defendant's procedural expenses.
The fight for justice is not hopeless!
No comments:
Post a Comment