Month: May 2024

We recently received a report from a major client in the maritime industry (also expanding into offshore wind energy) concerning disturbing disputes between two employees, where, according to witness statements, the conflict had escalated to physical altercations.

The matter also caught the attention of the social labor inspector, who sided with one of the parties involved.

From our law firm’s perspective, the case was straightforward – mobbing. Unfortunately, the client had not previously encountered such issues, despite having a significant number of employees. On one hand, it’s very good news that over a decade of operations had passed without employee-related problems. On the other hand, the client was unprepared procedurally to handle the situation in accordance with the law.

The Labor Code and other regulations require employers to establish procedures, even for such issues. However, in the maze of regulations and their interpretations by courts and the Labor Inspectorate, it’s easy to get lost.

To resolve the problem as quickly as possible, we developed a “step-by-step” procedure, through which the HR department conducted a thorough investigation involving the parties concerned. We also supported the directors in making a fair and, most importantly, legally compliant decision.

Crucially, our actions effectively prepared the client for similar situations in the future in a completely organic manner:

• without boring training sessions,
• without complicated legal explanations,
• with a clear, transparent, and automated procedure.

While we hope that employee conflicts remain rare, it’s essential to ensure that you are prepared for them.

Our law firm can help you with this.

In 2022, a client approached our law firm after purchasing a yacht. The purchase agreement had already been signed, but the client decided to change the financing method for the project. A new player entered the transaction: the lessor. This required renegotiation of the contract terms.

The negotiations were prolonged, as the seller intended to open a branch in another European Union country. Consequently, the yacht was to be delivered in that country.

However, it soon became clear that the seller would not be able to establish the entity in the agreed country or obtain the necessary tax details in time. This necessitated yet another revision of the contract’s final wording.

The original agreement stipulated that the yacht would be received abroad. As a result, the seller offered an additional service: transporting the yacht to Poland, where it was to be used. The seller also committed to assembling the yacht, commissioning it, and covering all associated costs.

Since the seller could not complete the sale abroad, a change was necessary: the yacht was to be delivered in Poland. The additional transport service was no longer needed, as the obligation to transport the yacht shifted to the seller under the sales agreement. However, other obligations of the seller remained unchanged.

After the yacht was delivered to Poland, the seller attempted to increase the yacht’s price to cover additional costs that, according to the contract, were his responsibility. Not only did he try to pass on the costs of the delivery delay to the buyer, but he also attempted to charge for transporting the yacht to Poland and commissioning it.

Thanks to the assistance of our law firm’s lawyers, the buyer successfully:

• constructed a buyer-friendly contract that protected his rights,
• avoided being burdened with costs that the seller was contractually obligated to cover.

This case involved further complications: the seller refused to deliver all the yacht’s equipment that was supposed to be included. As a result, the client has taken the matter to court, and the case is ongoing.

In 2024, a German lawyer reached out to us for assistance with a yacht registration issue. His client, a German citizen, had registered a yacht under the Polish flag, appointing a representative to facilitate the registration process. However, the client never received the final registration document from the representative.

The client decided that he ultimately wanted to sail under the German flag, not the Polish one. And that’s where the problems began.

To deregister the yacht from the Polish registry, it is necessary to return the registration document. But what can you do when the yacht owner never received it. The representative has disappeared, and all attempts to contact him have failed. So, what now.

The district office is Silesian Voivodeship, where the yacht was registered, informed us that the registration document has been collected. This meant that appointing another representative to retrieve the document was not an option.

In this situation, we applied for duplicate of the registration document. The application needed to be properly justified. Fortunately, this could be done at any district office in Poland, not just the one where the yacht was originally registered.

Our law firm is based in Szczecin, so the ability to file the application anywhere helped us avoid logistical challenges.

After about two weeks, the so called “plastic” arrived at the office. As a result, the yacht could be smoothly deregistered.

Common sense might suggest that since the owner intends to deregister the yacht anyway, the final registration document isn’t necessary. However, the law is the law, and as lawyers often say, there is no point in arguing with it.

What may seem like a trivial task can become quite problematic, especially when the yacht is registered under a flag foreign to the client. Fortunately, thanks to our experience in yacht registration and legalization matters, we knew how to resolve the issue.

If you need to register your yacht quickly and efficiently, our law firm can assist you. We offer services not only related to yacht registration but also obtaining radio licenses, EPIRB or PLB registration, and if your yacht is over 24 meters, we can easily register it in the ship registry.