Facts
The case concerns the question of whether the Conciliation Authority is obliged to issue a decision if it has formally opened a decision-making procedure and allowed the parties to plead in it.
The appellant A. AG in liquidation had filed a claim against B. GmbH with the Conciliation Authority. After the conciliation negotiations had failed, the appellant requested a decision at the "conciliation hearing" on November 18, 2015. The Justice of the Peace "accepted the request" and a "main hearing" was held immediately afterwards, in which the parties pleaded on the merits. On November 20, 2015, the parties were sent the judgment proposal dated November 18, 2015.
The lower court considered this procedure to be correct. It stated that a request by the claimant party does not force the Conciliation Authority to make a decision. In particular, the Conciliation Authority may "even after the decision-making procedure has already been opened or conducted, submit a judgment proposal to the parties or issue the claim approval".
Considerations
The Federal Court shares this view. It states that Art. 212 para. 1 CPC does not generally oblige the Conciliation Authority to make a decision in accordance with the request of the claimant party, but merely gives it the possibility to do so at its discretion.
The Federal Court justifies this by stating that neither the wording nor the systematics of Art. 212 CPC allow for such a restriction of the Conciliation Authority's scope of action. Nor does the purpose of the norm, to settle simpler cases with a small amount in dispute by means of a decision by the Conciliation Authority, speak in favor of…