Trade and freight debt recovery in Bosnia and Herzegovina begins with an honest read of the file: what the contract or carriage document says, what the debtor still owns, and whether the value of the claim justifies formal proceedings. We tell exporters, freight forwarders and their insurers when a claim is worth pursuing and when it is not, before any fee is agreed.
A trade or freight debt that is not paid on demand normally moves to a formal demand, then to a civil claim before the competent court, and only afterward to enforcement against identified assets. The stages sit in that order regardless of the size of the invoice or the size of the cargo. Our trade and freight debt recovery work covers all three stages, so the file is assessed once and not re-priced at every handoff.
The work starts with a review of the contract, the bill of lading or carriage document, and the debtor's known assets, often supported by an asset and solvency check before any claim is filed. That review tells the client whether the debtor has something worth enforcing against, which is the question that decides whether litigation is worth starting at all.
Bosnian courts decide trade claims on the paper trail: the contract or booking confirmation, the invoice, proof of delivery, or a signed consignment note, and any written acknowledgement of the debt. A freight claim built on a signed CMR note is treated differently from a carriage debt resting only on an unsigned purchase order.
A limitation period applies to every commercial claim, and it runs from the date the debt fell due, not from the date the creditor decides to act. We check the applicable limitation periods in cross-border claims before advising on strategy, because a claim filed after the deadline has closed is worth nothing however strong the paperwork.
The debtor's usual defences are a quality dispute on the goods, a claim of set-off against an unrelated invoice, or a denial that the person who signed for the cargo had authority to do so. Each defence is answered from the documents gathered at intake, not argued after the fact.
Pre-legal collection in Bosnia and Herzegovina, meaning direct contact with the debtor before any court filing, is carried out by a registered provider in the country, not by SOLUTIO. We appoint and instruct that provider, review what it recovers, and decide with the client when to stop chasing and start suing.
Where the debtor also trades across the border, the same file can run in a neighboring market on the same footing, including trade debt recovery in Croatia, but each jurisdiction is assessed and priced on its own facts.
Once a claim reaches litigation, the file is handled by admitted lawyers and licensed providers in Bosnia and Herzegovina, instructed and supervised by SOLUTIO throughout. We set the strategy, brief local counsel, and keep control of the file end to end; the correspondent files the claim, appears at hearings, and enforces on instruction.
The fee for that stage is set out in writing before any correspondent is instructed. It does not rest solely on a share of what is eventually recovered, and the client sees the basis before agreeing to proceed.
A foreign judgment generally requires a recognition step before enforcement can proceed, and the debtor can raise objections at that stage. We assess whether recognition is realistic on the facts before recommending it as the route.
The length depends on whether the debtor contests the claim, on the court's caseload, and on whether enforcement against assets becomes necessary afterward. We give a case-specific estimate once the documents and the debtor's likely position are known, not a general figure.
Yes. Proceedings are conducted through admitted lawyers and licensed providers in the country, instructed and supervised by SOLUTIO. The client deals with one point of contact throughout, not directly with the correspondent.
For a creditor with a counterparty in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the balance owed does not shrink while the file waits on a desk, and the limitation period keeps running regardless of who is deciding what to do next. The freight or trade invoice that looked recoverable at ninety days can look very different once the debtor has sold the assets that would have satisfied it. The decision that matters is not whether to act, but whether to act on this file at all.