◆ Simon Lee Esq. and Max Liu Esq. recovered advance payment to a Chinese company for an Austria Company

 

After a long wait, almost a year, Huli District Court in Xiamen finally rendered and served the judgment on the Chinese Tomb Sweeping Festival (Qingming) in 2022. Almost all of plaintiff's claims were supported, except the claim for compensating the lawyer's fees.

 

 

In early 2020, as the epidemic spread worldwide, virus-prevention materials were being snapped up. The Austrian company increased its procurement after several deals were made with a company in Xiamen. The Austrian company made a full payment (wire transfer) of US $450 thousand in advance and right on placing the order. The Xiamen company delivered some of the goods, but more than half of the goods were not delivered on time and seemed to be impossible to make remedy to delvier the balance of the goods. Therefore, the Austrian company proposed to cancel the order and refund the payment. After several negotiations and resorting to other measures of help, no refund of a penny was made. At the end of 2020, the Austrian company decided to engage Simon Lee Esq. a lawyer from Shangkun Law Firm LLP, to start a litigation to recover the payment. Max Liu was assigned as an associate to take charge of the proceeding.

 

Production of evidence and one court hearing were done on April 2021, some additional production was made on the summer of 2021, but judgment was withheld over a year. As a courtesy and respect, Plaintiff and its lawyer was waiting for the judgment and did not make a push to Mr. Justice, ever a polite one. The one year waiting is valued. Mr. Justice decided that Defendant should have had returned the advance payment on sometime of May 2020, or pay interest per interbank borrowing rate till the date when full return is finished.

 

 

When the judgement turned into force, the defendant’s lawyer expressed acceptance and respect of the judgment and would not appeal, but proposed to release defendant’s duty after the commencement of the law enforcement proceeding. Right when law enforcement job was started, the defendant's all other bank accounts were frozen, in addition to the attachment of one bank account on the stage of discovering. The defendant had no way but voluntarily and fully made payment per the judgment on the same day.