The client of our bureau, that specialises in providing warehousing services, for a long time provided such services to a car manufacturing company in St. Petersburg. When the contract was about to expire, the company decided not to prolong it and to move its goods to another warehouse. However, the removal of the goods was delayed for several days after the end of the contract. The company refused to pay the monthly contractual rate for storage of cargoes stipulated by the contract, referring to the fact that the contract had expired and our client could only demand reimbursement of his actual expenses in accordance with the provisions of Art. 896 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. The car manufacturer also committed other breaches, including non-payment for a number of services due to their alleged unconfirmed nature, totalling over RUR 26,000,000, excluding penalties.
Due to the refusal of the automobile manufacturer to voluntarily pay the debt and penalties, we appealed to the Arbitration Court of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region in defence of our client’s interests. The court of first instance in the case A56-23321/2024 fully agreed with our claims, pointing out that in connection with the failure to transport goods before the end of the contract term, the contract, in accordance with Article 425 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, prolonged its effect for the period of non-delivery. In this connection, the contractual condition on the monthly rate of payment for storage should be applied, and not the provisions of Article 896 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation
The automaker disagreed with the decision and appealed to the Thirteenth Arbitration Court of Appeal. In addition to the arguments expressed in the court of first instance, the company referred to the fact that the contract limits the amount of penalties for breach of payment in the amount of 1,000,000 rubles, so that the collection of penalties from the car factory for breach of payment for several UDD in the amount of more than 1,000,000 rubles is unlawful. The court of appeal instance upheld the judgement, disagreeing with the arguments of the complaint. Among other things, the court pointed out that due to the nature of the penalty as a measure to secure a civil law obligation (Article 330 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation), it secures each obligation separately. Since the contract is of a framework nature, the limitation of the penalty should be applied for the violation of payment terms for each of the three SDPs separately, and not for all SDPs at once.
The Arbitration Court of the North-West District also agreed with the judicial acts of the lower instances, refusing to satisfy the cassation appeal of the car plant.
