What is a court order and when is it issued?
Court orders date back to Ancient Rome. Praetorian interdicts are considered to be the prototype of modern court orders. Following the consideration of a case (causae cognitio) by a praetor, the latter issued an interdict (order) obliging the defendant to comply with an unconditional injunction. The interdict could be challenged without leaving the praetor’s court by requesting the appointment of a judge. In such a case, the application was considered by a judge, who could either confirm the interdict or revoke it.
The idea of a simplified procedure for considering cases was adopted by European medieval states and has survived to the present day.
Today, a court order is a special form of court decision issued by a court following the consideration of cases concerning the recovery of small amounts of money. At the same time, there must be no dispute regarding the amounts that the claimant is seeking to recover, i.e., it is assumed that the debtor does not dispute either the existence of the debt or the amount of the debt, and the court, when considering the claims in summary proceedings and issuing a court order, does not examine the merits of the claims made by the claimant.
It should be noted that the law does not provide a clear definition of “small amount,” but judicial practice, as a rule, equates it to “minor cases” and limits it to thirty times the minimum subsistence level (as of 2025, this amount is 90,840 hryvnias). At the same time, for certain categories of cases, the state has directly established a limit on “insignificant amounts,” with special restrictions applying to the payment of alimony and claims against legal entities or individual entrepreneurs.
In what cases can a court order be issued?
In addition to the amount limit, the law also limits the list of claims for which a court order may be issued. These claims include:
1) a claim for the recovery of wages and average earnings accrued but not paid to an employee for the period of delay in payment;
2) a claim for compensation for the costs of searching for the defendant, debtor, child, or the debtor’s vehicles;
3) a claim for the recovery of arrears for the payment of housing and communal services, electronic communication services, television and radio broadcasting services, taking into account the inflation index and 3 percent per annum accrued by the claimant on the amount of the arrears;
4) a claim for the recovery of alimony in the amount of one quarter for one child, one third for two children, for three or more children – half of the earnings (income) of the person paying alimony, but not more than ten subsistence minimums for a child of the corresponding age for each child, if this claim is not related to the establishment or contestation of paternity (maternity) and the need to involve other interested persons;
5) a claim for the recovery of child support in a fixed amount of 50 percent of the subsistence minimum for a child of the corresponding age, if this claim is not related to the establishment or contestation of paternity (maternity) and the need to involve other interested persons;
6) a claim for the return of the cost of goods of inadequate quality, if there is a court decision that has entered into legal force establishing the fact of the sale of goods of inadequate quality, adopted in favor of an indefinite circle of consumers;
7) a claim against a legal entity or individual – entrepreneur to recover debt under a contract (other than for the provision of housing and communal services, electronic communications services, television and radio broadcasting services) concluded in writing (including electronic form), if the amount of the claim does not exceed one hundred times the minimum subsistence level for able-bodied persons.
The court shall consider the application for a court order within five days of receiving information about the registered place of residence (stay) of the individual debtor. If the debtor specified in the application for a court order is a legal entity or individual entrepreneur, the court shall consider the application within five days of its receipt.
In this case, the application for a court order is considered without a court hearing and without notifying the applicant and the debtor. The court order itself is an enforceable document that can be presented to the enforcement authorities.
In such situations, we recommend seeking professional assistance from our law firm in Ukraine, with experienced lawyers in Kyiv who have expertise in summary proceedings. Qualified legal advice will help you prepare your application correctly and avoid procedural errors. An experienced lawyer will ensure that your interests are properly represented in court and increase your chances of a positive outcome.
Procedure for appealing a court order
As mentioned above, a court order is a special form of court decision.
This feature is manifested not only in the conditional scope of its issuance, in restrictions on the amounts and categories of cases for which a court order may be issued, but also in the peculiarities of its cancellation, since a court order, unlike a court decision, is not subject to appeal.A court order may be revoked by the same court that issued it, for which purpose a corresponding application for revocation of the court order must be filed with the court.
This application may be filed within fifteen days of the date of delivery of a copy of the court order to the debtor. It should be noted here that the court, together with the court order, must send a copy of the application for the issuance of a court order and the documents attached to such application.
The application for revocation of the court order shall be accompanied by a document confirming payment of the court fee (0.05 of the minimum subsistence level for able-bodied persons, which as of 2025 is 151.40 hryvnia), a request for the restoration of the missed deadline (if the application for the revocation of the court order is filed after the expiry of the fifteen-day period for filing such an application) and a document confirming the powers of the debtor’s representative (if the application is filed by the debtor’s representative).
The submission of a duly executed application for cancellation of a court order within the specified time limit is an unconditional ground for the court to issue a ruling cancelling the court order.
At the same time, court orders for the recovery of alimony cannot be canceled by the court that issued them. The debtor under such a court order may either file a claim for a reduction in the amount of alimony in general proceedings or file an application for a review of the case on the basis of newly discovered circumstances.
Also, at the request of the claimant or the debtor, the court may declare the court order unenforceable in whole or in part.
The grounds for recognizing an enforcement document as unenforceable in whole or in part are the court’s finding that the court order was issued in error or if the debt is wholly or partially extinguished due to its termination, voluntary performance, or other reasons.
The cancellation of a court order is a process that, on the one hand, is formalized by a single application, but on the other hand, is a responsible step that requires professional knowledge and skills. After all, the submission of an improperly executed application for the cancellation of a court order will result in its return by the court without consideration and complicate the appeal of the court order in the future.
If a court order has been issued against you, please contact the lawyers of the First Legal Law Firm by filling out the application form on our website or by calling us at: +38 (044) 35-35-164, +38 (067) 306-89-89, +38 (063) 45-85-448, +38 (099) 367-89-89.