News-Archive

Coronavirus is having a massive impact on a many lessees and lessors. Shops and restaurants have had to be closed. Revenue has dropped and it is difficult to meet claims arising from contractual obligations. As lease relationships can - unless the contract stipulates otherwise - already be terminated without notice if the lessee falls into arrears with payment of the rent or a more than inconsiderable part of the rent for two consecutive due dates, or falls into arrears with the payment of the rent in a period extending over more than two due dates in a sum totaling the rent for two months, the Bundestag has today adopted temporary changes for lease and loan agreements, among other things.

Read more

Yesterday (25 March 2020), the German Parliament [Bundestag] passed the so-called Gesetz zur Abmilderung der Folgen der COVID-19-Pandemie im Zivil-, Insolvenz- und Strafverfahrensrecht [Act Mitigating the Civil, Insolvency and Criminal Procedural Law Consequences of the COVID-19 Pandemic]. The changes to insolvency law provided for therein through the COVID-Insolvenz-Aussetzungsgesetz - COVInsAG [COVID Insolvency Suspension Act] are far-reaching. Managers of enterprises which have gotten into difficulties due to the COVID-19 pandemic are being released from the obligation to file for insolvency until 30 September 2020.

Read more

Coronavirus is having a massive impact on many companies and businesses. Further questions are arising on almost a daily basis and the legislator is trying to support the economy. We would like to draw your attention to the current developments.

Read more

On 13 March, Oppenhoff & Partner set up a Corona Task Force to bundle the relevant know-how in the current situation and to be able to efficiently handle the increasing number of client questions.

Read more

On 16 March the Federal Government and representatives of the federal states agreed on guidelines to fight the corona epidemic. The guidelines provide for drastic restrictions on public life and closures of non-key sector establishments. The federal states and competent local authorities are expected to implement these guidelines in the short term, if they have not already done so.

Read more

(Update: 18 March 2020)

Read more

It is not that long ago that the German Federal Cartel Office [Bundeskartellamt, “BKA”] defeated Amazon Marketplace. Commercial traders can sell their goods directly to customers via the internet platform.

Read more

On 20 September 2019, Federal Employment Minister Hubertus Heil presented a report on the results of his Dialogue for the Future "New Work. New Security." in Berlin. The report contains a multitude of proposals and declarations of intent for shaping tomorrow's work environment. These include the expansion of personal time accounts and state aid for time-outs for specific purposes, as well as the examination of an individual's legal entitlement to a personal long-term account. The introduction of an individual entitlement to mobile work is also going to be considered in cases not opposed by operational reasons. Whether, when and how such ideas will find their way into business reality cannot yet be foreseen. What is certain, however, is that they will substantially change work in future and that they will present employers with considerable organisational challenges. In this Newsletter, we report as always on current innovations in jurisprudence and legislation.

Read more

This week the II. Civil Senate of the Federal Court of Justice [Bundesgerichtshof, BGH] responsible for legal disputes arising in the field of corporate law published a decision specifying the requirements for temporary workers to be counted in determining the threshold for the constitution of a co-determined supervisory board under the German Codetermination Act [Mitbestimmungsgesetz, MitbestG].

Read more

In light of the ECJ’s ruling of today, we would like to draw your attention to current developments on the use of tracking cookies for analytics or marketing purposes on websites. We expect a considerable need for changes in practice, with significant consequences for online marketing.

Read more