Handling fee

Processing fee is a fee charged by a company or government agency that is charged for the administrative costs associated with orders or the provision of services .

species

There are two types of processing fees:

• By law : Processing fees can be triggered by chargeable official acts . Such processing fees can not be levied by authorities without legal justification, but must be regulated by law or ordinance . According to Section 69 (5) of the Residence Act, for example, a processing fee is charged for applying for official acts that are subject to a fee. In § 49 para. 1 Residence Ordinance the collection is a processing fee for processing an application for a residence permit for permanent residence in the EC regulated. The processing fee for a citizenship card is 25 euros in accordance with Section 3 Paragraph 1 No. 3 of the Citizenship Fee Ordinance (StAGebV)  . Binding information is subject to a fee in accordance with Section 89 Paragraphs 3 to 5 of the Tax Code .
• Processing fees agreed by companies in a contract are usually governed by general terms and conditions. Because of consumer protection, these are the focus of case law , especially with bank charges . The processing fee for consumer loans was charged by credit institutions for loan processing until October 2014 . The BGH decided in May and October 2014 that the processing fee for personal loans demanded by many banks is inadmissible because the agreement of processing fees for consumer credit agreements in general terms and conditions pursuant to Section 307 (1) sentence 1, paragraph 2 no. 1 BGB is ineffective is. These include in particular installment and car loans as well as loans for real estate financing . Since these processing fees do not depend on the duration, they do not count as interest in the legal sense. Since then, processing fees for consumer credit can no longer be charged. Other processing fees in the context of bank services, for which credit institutions comply with a legal obligation, may not be charged. This includes, for example, the fee for issuing a cancellation permit . The same applies to so-called valuation fees .

Processing fees at credit institutions

The processing fees charged by banks play an important role. Processing fees in the usual banking amount of up to 2% were not objected to in the earlier case law of the BGH - without further justification - as early as June 1979. Such processing fees represent a legally controllable additional price agreement . In loan law it was generally recognized that the processing fee was a represents a one-time, lump-sum payment ( loan fee ), which was used to cover the administrative expenses of the lending bank in processing and paying out loans. The processing fee should, in particular the pre-contractual expenses remuneration for the related to the examination of the creditworthiness of the consumer so obtained and the contract preparation, such as for the management of customer calls, capturing the customer requirements and customer data. In addition, processing fees cover the costs incurred for the execution and review of the contract , the procurement and payment of the loan value, as well as any further processing, testing and monitoring activities required after the conclusion of the contract.

In 2014, the Federal Court of Justice first declared the form-based agreement to be inadmissible for consumer credit agreements, before expressly expanding this case law to include business loans in 2017. This has led to the fact that, since then, banks occasionally require “one-time, non-term-dependent individual contributions” in their terms and conditions, which deviates from the principle that the payment for loans should be based on the term in the form of the loan interest . A processing fee clause is also pre-formulated in a loan contract if the user of the clause regularly requests a processing fee in the amount of fixed percentages when concluding loan contracts or if he calculates the fee based on the data of the individual loan contract according to certain specifications and then includes it in the contract.

Validity of processing fees

On the basis of the consumer-friendly rulings of the Federal Court of Justice, which led to numerous claims for reimbursement by customers about the processing fee, the credit institutions have since regularly refrained from charging a processing fee. The judgments refer to processing fees that are standardized in the terms and conditions - regardless of their designation. However, fees individually agreed with bank customers are still permitted. In December 2010 , the BGH expressly approved the acquisition fees charged when concluding home loan and savings contracts .

See also

• Rescheduling
• Effective interest rate

Individual evidence

1. ↑ BGH, judgment of May 13, 2014, Az .: XI ZR 405/12 = BGHZ 201, 168
2. ↑ BGH, judgment of October 28, 2014, Az .: XI ZR 348/13 = BGHZ 203, 115
3. ↑ BGH, judgment of May 7, 1991, Az .: XI ZR 244/90
4. ↑ Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court, judgment of November 5, 2009, Az .: I-6 U 17/09
5. ↑ cf. BGH NJW 1979, 2089 , 2090
6. ↑ Helmut Bruchner / Hans-Michael Krepold, in: Herbert Schimansky / Hermann-Josef Bunte / Hans Jürgen Lwowski, Bankrechts-Handbuch , 2011, § 78 Rn. 116, 108; Tom Billing, On the legal admissibility of a processing fee for loan agreements , WM 2013, 1829, 1831
7. ^ Gerd Nobbe , Admissibility of bank charges , WM 2008, 185, 193
8. ↑ BGH, judgments of May 13, 2014 - XI ZR 405/12 = BGHZ 201, 168 and XI ZR 170/13 = BGHZ 201, 168
9. ↑ BGH, judgments of July 4, 2017 - XI ZR 562/15 and XI ZR 233/16 = BGHZ 215, 172
10. ↑ BGH, judgment of May 13, 2014, Az .: XI ZR 170/13
11. ↑ BGH, judgment of December 7, 2010, Az .: XI ZR 3/10 = BGHZ 187, 360

Please note the information on legal issues!