Frequently Asked Questions | SisPACSE

To request the intervention of a conciliator registered in SisPACSE, you must complete the electronic form.

When you access the form or your reserved area, you will be asked to authenticate yourself, at which point you can create your user account if you haven't already done so.

SisPACSE does not allow the following to be settled:

• Debts to Social Security/Finance;
• Debts with guarantees: Car loans; House loans; Commercial credit.
• Debts without guarantees: Personal and consumer loans; Credit cards.

Through SisPACSE, the following can be settled:

• Debts for the provision of services: water, electricity, gas, internet;
• Provision of beauty services;
• Provision of accounting services;
• Debts to suppliers;
• Debts related to housing and commercial rents;
• Debts contracted through loans between individuals

Debtors who are legal entities and those who are natural persons, who have pending insolvency procedures, special revitalization procedures or special procedures for payment agreement, regulated by the Insolvency and Company Rescue Code (CIRE), or when tax credits and Social Security credits are involved, as well as legal transactions covered by the Action Plan for the Risk of Default and the Extrajudicial Procedure for Regularising Situations of Default, cannot use SISPACSE.

Bank customers who are having difficulty fulfilling their credit agreements can resort to the Support Network for Indebted Consumers (RACE).

SISPACSE became operational on 30 September 2021.

The participation in the information session is free of charge for both debtors and creditors.

If the parties decide to proceed to the negotiation phase, the debtor will pay a one-off fee of 30 euros (regardless of the number of sessions held and the outcome of the procedure). The payment shall be made via a Single Collection Document to be issued by DGPJ and provided by the conciliator.

Only individual debtors, resident in the national territory, who are in default (late payment), imminent default, or definitive non-compliance with pecuniary obligations, including sole traders, may use SisPACSE.

A creditor who has agreed to participate in the negotiation phase, while it is ongoing, is prevented from instituting any action or taking any enforcement action aimed at collecting his/her debts, as well as from requesting the debtor's insolvency.

The parties summoned to do so are bound by the duty to attend the information session.

The unjustified absence of the creditor determines the increase by 75% of the court fees due for the filing, by the creditor, of legal actions for the collection of credits whose negotiation is requested in SISPACSE, including the injunction procedure (See paragraph 3 of article 6 of Decree-Law 105/2020, of 23 December.

The conciliation procedure may be carried out in any place that is suitable for this purpose and that has been provided by the conciliator or through the use of a real-time sound and image transmission platform designated by the conciliator to all those involved.

The agreement entered into between the debtor, his/her creditors and any guarantors, with the intervention of the conciliator, constitutes an enforceable title under the terms of the provisions of subparagraph d) of paragraph 1 of article 703 of the Code of Civil Procedure.

At the end of the information session, the parties must express their willingness to continue or not to the negotiation phase.

The result of the session must be written down on a form, which must be signed by all those involved when the session takes place in person, or accompanied by a sound and video recording of the expressions of will of those involved, in all other cases.

Once the debtor's application form has been received, the conciliator in charge of the procedure is appointed.

The conciliator then schedules an initial information session, and all the parties involved (debtor, creditor(s) and any guarantors) are notified.

The purpose of the information session is to inform the debtor and his/her creditors about the objectives to be achieved through SisPACSE, the techniques to be used and the legal effectiveness of the agreements concluded within its scope.

Negotiations under SisPACSE aim to reach an agreement between the parties, avoiding the resort to the courts, and are governed by the guiding principles of out-of-court recovery of debtors, set out in the Council of Ministers Resolution 43/2011 of 25 October, while also observing the principles of voluntariness and confidentiality of the procedure, the equality of the parties and the responsibility of the conciliator, as set out in articles 4 to 7 and article 8(2) of Law 29/2013 of 19 April.

The procedure has a maximum duration of 60 days, counted consecutively, as of the date of appointment of the conciliator. This period may be extended once for the same period, by written agreement of all the parties involved.