Debt Collection Agency in Ukraine - No Win, No Fee

Step 1 - How does amicable (pre-legal) debt collection work in Ukraine?

Amicable collection in Ukraine is a purely contractual process: reminders, a formal written demand and a negotiated payment or instalment agreement, with no court involved and no coercive power behind it. It resolves most undisputed invoices, and it is optional rather than mandatory, because the Constitutional Court of Ukraine held in Decision No. 15-rp/2002 that pre-trial settlement is a creditor's RIGHT, not an obligation. You may therefore go straight to court if you choose, unless your own contract contains a pre-trial clause.

What happens, and when

Debitura's Ukrainian partner works to a documented pre-legal workflow, and the average recovery time on Ukrainian claims handled through it is 80 days.

The rules that bind a collector approaching a consumer

Where the debtor is a private individual, the Law on Consumer Rights Protection No. 1023-XII and the Law on Consumer Lending regulate how contact may be made: consent is required before the debtor is contacted and before debt information is shared with third parties, disclosure duties apply, and the National Bank of Ukraine operates the complaint mechanism. These rules govern conduct only. They do not change the three-year Article 257 limitation period, and they do not apply to a business-to-business trade debt.

When to stop negotiating and escalate

Escalate when the debtor disputes the debt in substance, goes silent after a formal demand, breaks an agreed instalment plan, or when the Article 257 clock is approaching expiry. Because the martial-law suspension of limitation periods was repealed with effect from 4 September 2025 and elapsed days carry forward rather than reset, an older Ukrainian claim can be closer to expiry than it looks, so the limitation calculation is worth doing before, not after, another round of negotiation.

Step 2 - How do you obtain an enforceable title in Ukraine?

An enforceable title in Ukraine is a court decision or court order that an enforcement officer can act on, and the route to it depends first on your debtor's legal status, not on the size of your claim. Claims against legal entities and individual entrepreneurs go to the commercial (economic) courts, the hospodarski sudy, which hold exclusive jurisdiction over them. Claims against private individuals go to the general civil courts, and jurisdiction inside each system normally follows the debtor's location or registered seat.

The fast route: the court-order procedure (sudovyi nakaz)

Article 161 of the Civil Procedure Code lets a creditor obtain a court order without a hearing where the debt arises from a written contract, the debtor is a legal entity or an individual entrepreneur, and the claim does not exceed 100 times the subsistence minimum for able-bodied persons, which works out at approximately UAH 332,800 for 2026 (100 times the UAH 3,328 figure applying from 1 January 2026). Two limits matter in practice. First, the route is closed against a pure consumer debtor, who must be sued in ordinary or simplified proceedings instead. Second, the order is fragile by design: if the debtor files an objection, the order is cancelled automatically and the claim continues as a normal action, so the procedure is best understood as a cheap test of whether the debt is genuinely undisputed.

The simplified and ordinary routes

Below the ordinary track sits a simplified minor-case procedure. Its threshold was cut following a Constitutional Court of Ukraine ruling of 22 November 2023 and the resulting amendment, from 100 times the subsistence minimum (250 times in consumer cases) to 30 times, so materially fewer claims now qualify than under the pre-2024 rules. Anything above that, and anything genuinely contested, goes to ordinary proceedings: a full exchange of pleadings and evidence, hearings, and legal representation in practice. Court fees are payable by the claimant on filing and are recoverable from the debtor if you succeed. Ukrainian courts have continued operating throughout martial law using relocated hearings, video conferencing and electronic case records, but individual case durations vary too widely to publish a reliable figure, so your partner will quote a timetable on the specific file rather than a national average.

More on court proceedings in Ukraine

Documents and language

Proceedings are conducted in Ukrainian, and foreign-language contracts, invoices and correspondence need a certified translation before they can be put in evidence. A creditor's file is usually strongest when it contains the signed contract or order confirmation, the invoice, proof of delivery or performance, the payment history, and the written demand already sent in the amicable phase.

Which code governs your file

The Civil Procedure Code governs claims against individuals; the Economic Procedure Code governs claims heard by the commercial courts. Both feed the same appellate structure: Courts of Appeal, then the relevant Cassation Court within the Supreme Court. Note that the Commercial Code of Ukraine was repealed with effect from 28 August 2025 under a three-year transitional regime, so substantive arguments that used to rest on it should now be pleaded from the Civil Code.

A note on scope

Because of international restrictions, claims cannot be pursued through this service in Crimea or in the currently Russian-occupied parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions.

Step 3 - How does debt enforcement work in Ukraine?

Enforcement in Ukraine begins when you present an enforceable title, a court decision or court order, to an enforcement officer and apply to open enforcement proceedings. Only an enforcement officer may take coercive steps: no collection agency, law firm or creditor may attach an asset, freeze an account or garnish a wage directly.

Two enforcement systems, one set of powers

Ukraine runs a dual enforcement system. The State Enforcement Service is the public arm. Private enforcement officers were introduced by Law No. 1404-VIII on Bodies and Persons Enforcing Court Decisions and have operated alongside it since 2016 and 2017. A private officer may only open a case where the debtor or the relevant property sits within their own district, but once the case is opened the officer can act across Ukraine. Choosing a private officer is often attractive for a foreign creditor because the officer's own remuneration depends on actually collecting, but both categories exercise the same statutory powers under the Law on Enforcement Proceedings.

What an enforcement officer can do

Debtor protections and asset exemptions

Ukrainian enforcement law protects a minimum standard of living: a portion of the debtor's income and a defined list of essential personal and household items are exempt from seizure, and the officer must apply those exemptions whichever system the case runs in. A debtor who obstructs enforcement can face fines or referral for further action, but obstruction does not enlarge what the officer may seize.

Practical constraints creditors should plan for

Enforcement cannot be carried out in Crimea or in the currently Russian-occupied parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, and enforcement against assets located there is not available. Wartime measures have also periodically restricted enforcement steps in specific circumstances, so the realistic first question in any Ukrainian enforcement file is where the debtor's attachable assets actually sit. Where collateral was taken at contract stage, a secured creditor's position is materially stronger, both in enforcement and later in any insolvency.

Cross-border debt collection in Ukraine

Ukraine is not an EU member state, so the automatic recognition and enforcement regime of the Brussels I Recast Regulation does not apply to a judgment you obtained elsewhere in Europe. Ukraine has held EU candidate status since June 2022 and accession negotiations are ongoing, but candidate status alone changes nothing about judgment recognition today.

Foreign court judgments

A foreign court judgment is recognised and enforced in Ukraine on the basis of an applicable bilateral treaty or, failing that, on the principle of reciprocity, and it requires a fresh application to the competent Ukrainian court rather than direct presentation to an enforcement officer. Whether a treaty covers your judgment is the first question to answer, because it determines both the route and the likely timetable. The precise procedural articles governing recognition of foreign judgments could not be confirmed against primary text for this guide, so treat the mechanism above as the shape of the process and take local advice on the specific filing.

Arbitral awards

Ukraine is a party to the New York Convention 1958 on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards, so a foreign arbitral award is on markedly firmer ground than a foreign court judgment. Where you are still negotiating contracts with Ukrainian counterparties, an arbitration clause is the single most effective cross-border enforceability improvement available.

Serving documents and taking evidence

Ukraine is a contracting party to the Hague Service Convention 1965, with declarations filed in 2001, 2004 and 2022, and to the Hague Evidence Convention. Cross-border service on a Ukrainian debtor should therefore follow the Convention channels rather than ordinary post, and getting service right at the outset avoids the most common reason a later recognition application fails.