Information

Func­tion of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board

Is the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board a neu­tral in­ter­me­di­ary, and are the par­ties bound by its pro­posed set­tle­ment?

The Con­cil­i­a­tion Board is neu­tral and acts as a com­pe­tent in­ter­me­di­ary with ex­ten­sive ex­pe­ri­ence in the fi­nan­cial ser­vices sec­tor. With the aim of avoid­ing lengthy and costly court pro­ceed­ings, vol­un­tary ex­tra­ju­di­cial dis­pute res­o­lu­tion pro­ce­dures in var­i­ous forms have been suc­cess­fully used for many years in nu­mer­ous coun­tries.
The Con­cil­i­a­tion Board is nei­ther a court nor does it pos­sess any ju­di­cial au­thor­ity. In­stead, it fa­cil­i­tates di­a­logue be­tween the par­ties in­volved and pre­sents them with a pro­posed set­tle­ment. Since the par­ties are not bound by the pro­posal of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board, they are free to ac­cept it or to pur­sue other mea­sures, for ex­am­ple legal ac­tion. If both par­ties agree to the set­tle­ment pro­posal made by the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board, they are bound by the set­tle­ment, which then be­comes en­force­able in court.

Prin­ci­ples of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board

To en­sure a fair and trans­par­ent me­di­a­tion pro­ce­dure, the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board ad­heres to the fol­low­ing prin­ci­ples:

  • In­de­pen­dence of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board, to en­sure im­par­tial con­duct.
  • Trans­par­ency of the pro­ce­dure, en­abling the par­ties to ob­tain all nec­es­sary in­for­ma­tion and eval­u­ate the re­sults ob­jec­tively.
  • Con­tra­dic­tory pro­ce­dure, al­low­ing both par­ties the op­por­tu­nity to pre­sent their ar­gu­ments and be in­formed of the op­pos­ing party’s po­si­tion.
  • Ef­fi­ciency of the pro­ce­dure, through an at­tempt at con­cil­i­a­tion which – apart from a cost con­tri­bu­tion of CHF 50.00 to be paid by the com­plain­ant – is oth­er­wise free of charge and does not re­quire the in­volve­ment of legal coun­sel.
  • Free­dom of ac­tion, as the de­ci­sion is only bind­ing on both par­ties if both have agreed to the set­tle­ment pro­posal of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board.
  • Pos­si­bil­ity of rep­re­sen­ta­tion, should a party wish to be rep­re­sented by a third party.

Pro­fes­sional con­fi­den­tiality

Is the con­cil­i­a­tor sub­ject to con­fi­den­tial­ity?

The Con­cil­i­a­tion Board / con­cil­i­a­tor is sub­ject to con­fi­den­tial­ity. The Con­cil­i­a­tion Board will only con­tact the in­sti­tu­tion in­volved if the client has given con­sent.

Statute of Lim­i­ta­tions

In pro­ceed­ings con­ducted pur­suant to the FSV, the ini­ti­a­tion of such con­cil­i­a­tion pro­ceed­ings nei­ther in­ter­rupts nor sus­pends lim­i­ta­tion pe­ri­ods.

In con­cil­i­a­tion pro­ceed­ings con­ducted un­der the Al­ter­na­tive Dis­pute Res­o­lu­tion Act (AStG), the con­sumer’s in­ter­ven­tion be­fore the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board does not de­fin­i­tively in­ter­rupt a lim­i­ta­tion pe­riod, but it sus­pends the com­mence­ment and con­tin­u­a­tion of the lim­i­ta­tion pe­riod as well as other dead­lines for as­sert­ing the rights and claims af­fected by the pro­ce­dure. Such sus­pen­sion, how­ever, only oc­curs if the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board is com­pe­tent to han­dle the sub­mit­ted com­plaint.



Or­di­nance and Rules of Pro­ce­dure

The rights and ob­li­ga­tions of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board have been es­tab­lished by the Gov­ern­ment in the Or­di­nance of 27 Oc­to­ber 2009 on the ex­tra­ju­di­cial Con­cil­i­a­tion Board in the fi­nan­cial ser­vices sec­tor (Fi­nanz­dienst­leis­tungs-Schlich­tungs­stel­len-Verord­nung, FSV). This Or­di­nance, as well as the Rules of Pro­ce­dure is­sued on 14 June 2016, ap­plies only to fi­nan­cial ser­vice providers des­ig­nated in Art. 10 FSV.

The rights and ob­li­ga­tions of the Con­cil­i­a­tion Board re­gard­ing con­cil­i­a­tion pro­ce­dures un­der the AStG are reg­u­lated in the Act of 04 No­vem­ber 2016 on Al­ter­na­tive Dis­pute Res­o­lu­tion in Con­sumer Mat­ters (LGBl. 2016 No. 516) and in the Rules of Pro­ce­dure ap­proved by the Gov­ern­ment on 17 De­cem­ber 2019.