General Terms and Conditions

General Terms and Conditions ETI experts GmbH – hereinafter referred to as “ETI” –

These General Terms and Conditions (GTC) apply to our collection services vis-à-vis companies. Claims from creditors who are consumers will not be accepted. Insofar as the customer refers to the inclusion of his own terms and conditions, these are contradicted. Individual contractual agreements take precedence over general terms and conditions.

§ 1 Subject matter

ETI shall take over the collection of due payment claims for its customers after the order has been placed and shall provide further services in connection therewith to the extent requested.

§ 2 Formation of the contract

The service descriptions on the internet pages of ETI do not yet represent offers for the conclusion of a service contract. The customer can request information and offers from us, e.g. by telephone, by email or via the contact form. We are bound to an offer submitted to the customer for a period of 2 months from receipt by the customer. Even after this period, however, we shall maintain our offer until revoked. The customer can accept our offer expressly or implied by transmitting a specific collection case.

§ 3 Information on electronic commerce

1. Technical steps for the conclusion of the contract
   See the explanations in paragraph 2 of our terms and conditions.
2. Contract text storage / printout
   The customer can save the contract text by using the function of his browser “Save as” to save the relevant Internet page on his computer. Through the print function of his browser, he also has the option to print out the contract text. We ourselves save the contract texts and make them available to the customer on request by email or by post.
3. Correction option
   The customer can correct his entries at any time during the ordering process by selecting the “Back” button in the browser and then making the appropriate change. By closing the web browser, the customer can cancel the entire ordering process at any time. Furthermore, the order overview before submitting the online order also offers an additional correction option, which is pointed out to the customer.
4. Language
   The language available for the conclusion of the contract is exclusively German.
5. Code of Conduct
   We have not subjected ourselves to any particular code of conduct (set of rules).

§ 4 Provisions for the performance of collection activities

1. ETI undertakes to carry out the legally possible and economically reasonable measures for the realization of the transferred receivables in a timely manner. Wishes of the customer regarding the procedure against individual debtors will be taken into account – as far as this is possible and expedient.
2. The customer agrees that
   1. ETI decides on the selection of the collection measures in the specific case in each case reasonable discretion;
   2. he is obliged during the entire processing period of the order to inform ETI without delay of any changes in the debtor’s financial situation, method of payment or personal assessment, furthermore to provide ETI with any documents that may be required in a timely manner and otherwise to cooperate with ETI in any required manner;
   3. he is not entitled, after having given the order, to take his own measures for the realization of the claim without prior coordination with ETI;
   4. he is obliged to inform ETI immediately if the claim is reduced or settled directly against him by payment or in any other way;
   5. ETI is entitled to conclude economically and legally expedient installment payment agreements of the transferred claim without the prior consent of the customer;

§ 5 Settlement of incoming payments

Payments on receivables handed over for collection shall, if legally permissible and subject to any contractual agreement to the contrary, regardless of who received them, first be offset against the 1. collection costs, 2. principal claim,
3. Secondary claim, 4. interest.

§ 6 Compensation, expenses and reimbursement of costs

1. ETI is entitled to a remuneration against the client (creditor), the basis of which is the collection service agreement. This is measured, if no other agreement is made, in the amount according to the amount that would also be entitled to a lawyer for the corresponding activity.
2. Commissions, if agreed in individual cases, are regulated in an individual additional contract. Without such a contract, no commissions are due.
3. The reimbursement of expenses may be regulated differently by individual agreement in text form.
4. From a debtor who fails to pay in breach of duty, the client may in principle demand that he indemnifies him from the collection remuneration (incl. necessary expenses) incurred by ETI, to which ETI is entitled against the client under the collection service agreement. This indemnification claim against the debtor (indemnification of the creditor through reimbursement of costs by the debtor to ETI) shall be assigned by the principal to ETI in lieu of performance upon conclusion of the collection service agreement. ETI, which hereby already accepts this assignment, shall attempt to collect the claim together with the costs incurred from the debtor. If this is not successful, ETI will not claim the collection fee (plus expenses) from the principal without a payment from the debtor. For the client, the activity of ETI without payment of the debtor is therefore not associated with costs.
5. 1. ETI will determine the amount of the claim for reimbursement of costs against the debtor in consideration of § 13e para. 1 Legal Services Act (RDG) and assert it: “A creditor may demand reimbursement of the costs charged to him by a debt collection service provider for his activity from his debtor as damages only up to the amount of the remuneration to which a lawyer would be entitled for this activity in accordance with the provisions of the Lawyers’ Remuneration Act.”

§ 7 Billing modalities and client information

1. Incoming payments will be settled by ETI under the booking date of receipt of payment.
2. ETI maintains a customer account for each customer as a current account, in which all receivables and payables are placed. A balancing of this account and thus a disbursement of collected third-party money and/or the invoicing of ETI’s receivables from the customer shall take place on a monthly basis, unless contractually agreed otherwise.

§ 8 Limitation

1. A limitation control by ETI with regard to the claims handed over for collection does not take place. In this respect, it is agreed that this is not part of the contractual content of the collection service agreement and that the customer organizes the monitoring of the limitation periods independently.
2. All claims against ETI concerning the settlement of a transferred claim shall be time-barred in one year from the date of the final settlement to the last known address of the customer.

§ 9 Liability

1. ETI is liable only for intent and gross negligence. This also applies to culpable breaches of duty by legal representatives or vicarious agents of ETI. The limitation of liability does not apply to damages resulting from injury to life, body or health, due to culpable breach of pre-contractual duties of information and clarification as well as breach of material contractual duties by ETI, its legal representatives or vicarious agents. An essential contractual obligation is any obligation, the fulfillment of which enables the proper execution of the contract in the first place and on the observance of which the contractual partner may regularly rely.
2. Inasmuch as the exclusion of liability according to paragraph 1 (above) does not apply, ETI shall, however, only be liable for the damage typical for the contract and foreseeable.

§ 10 Data protection

You can find the privacy policy for the implementation of the data protection requirements on our website www.eti-experts.de/datenschutzerklaerung/.

§ 11 Retention periods

On successful completion of a contract, ETI shall be entitled to destroy all documents received from the customer, with the exception of the debt instrument (if any), after one month from the date of dispatch of the final invoice to the customer’s last known address. In the event of non-success, this period shall be six months from the date ETI establishes the event of non-success. Destruction will only be carried out after the customer has been notified in text form and has not reacted or agreed to the destruction. Destruction will only be carried out insofar as and as long as there are no legal storage obligations to the contrary.

§ 12 Long-term monitoring

If the customer, in case of unsuccessful realization of his claim, has requested the transfer to a law firm suggested to him by ETI for the purpose of legal enforcement, the customer agrees to the following procedure – subject to revocation in text form at any time or any other agreement: In the event that the claim has been titled, but enforcement has been unsuccessful or is not pursued by the client or the client no longer orders further enforcement measures, the law firm may return its hand file together with enforcement titles to ETI in order to transfer the claim to long-term monitoring. ETI will then contact the client about the conditions of the claim management in the long-term monitoring. If the customer explicitly does not want any further realization measures, ETI will return the enforcement documents to him.

§ 13 Final Provisions

1. For all mutual claims of the contractual partners, Cologne is agreed as the place of performance and jurisdiction, provided that the contractual partners are merchants, legal entities under public law or special funds under public law. Likewise, Cologne is agreed as the place of performance and jurisdiction if the customer has no general place of jurisdiction in Germany.
2. If one of the above provisions is or becomes invalid, this shall not affect the validity of the remainder of these General Terms and Conditions.

(Status: 03.01.2022)