Background
A natural-person plaintiff brought a negative declaratory action (menfi tespit) seeking recovery of a payment made under threat of attachment (haciz tehdidi). The underlying transaction was a real estate preliminary sale agreement (gayrimenkul satış vaadi sözleşmesi) entered into between the plaintiff and a third-party company. In connection with that agreement, the plaintiff issued a promissory note to the company.
When the dispute arose, both courts of first instance declined jurisdiction. Istanbul 1st Consumer Court held that because the claim was rooted in a negotiable instrument (kambiyo senedi), the matter properly belonged before a commercial court. Istanbul 10th Commercial Court of First Instance countered that the instrument was a consumer promissory note (tüketici senedi) and that the case therefore belonged before a consumer court. With each court having issued a conflicting jurisdictional refusal, the file was referred to the Istanbul Regional Court of Appeal for binding designation of the competent forum under Articles 21 and 22 of the Code of Civil Procedure (Law No. 6100).
The Court’s Holding
The Istanbul Regional Court of Appeal, 37th Civil Chamber, unanimously designated Istanbul 1st Consumer Court as the competent forum. The court grounded its decision in Article 4/1-5 of the Consumer Protection Law (Law No. 6502), which provides: “For transactions carried out by a consumer, negotiable instruments may only be drawn as registered instruments (nama yazılı) and separately for each instalment payment. Instruments drawn contrary to this provision are invalid with respect to the consumer.” The court noted that the legislature extended this protection erga omnes — the instrument is invalid vis-à-vis the consumer even against parties who were not themselves party to the consumer transaction.
The chamber found that the promissory note in question was issued in direct connection with a consumer real estate preliminary sale agreement, that the note had been delivered to the third-party company in that capacity, and that it therefore constituted a consumer instrument (tüketici senedi) in character. Crucially, there was no evidence in the file that the plaintiff acted for commercial or professional purposes; accordingly, the plaintiff was properly classified as a consumer. Because the legal relationship at the root of the dispute is a consumer transaction, the litigation must be heard and concluded before a consumer court.
Key Takeaways
- Where both a consumer court and a commercial court each issue conflicting jurisdictional refusals, the Regional Court of Appeal resolves the impasse by binding designation under Articles 21–22 of the Code of Civil Procedure (Law No. 6100).
- Under Article 4/1-5 of Law No. 6502, a promissory note issued by a natural person in connection with a consumer transaction is a consumer instrument, and its invalidity operates in the consumer’s favour even against third-party holders of the note.
- Classification as a consumer instrument — and therefore consumer-court jurisdiction — turns on the nature of the underlying transaction and the absence of evidence that the plaintiff acted for commercial or professional purposes, not merely on the formal character of the note as a negotiable instrument.
- The designation order is final (kesin) and not subject to further appeal.
Why It Matters
This ruling reinforces that Turkish consumer-protection jurisdiction cannot be evaded simply by framing a claim around a promissory note rather than the underlying consumer contract. When a note originates in a consumer transaction — such as a real estate preliminary sale agreement — the consumer-court forum attaches regardless of the instrument’s negotiable character, and courts may not redirect plaintiffs to the commercial-court track on that basis alone.
The decision also illustrates the practical operation of the negative-jurisdiction deadlock mechanism under the Turkish Code of Civil Procedure: the Regional Court of Appeal acts as the mandatory tie-breaker whenever two courts of first instance issue conflicting jurisdictional refusals, providing parties with a definitive and promptly enforceable forum designation rather than leaving them in procedural limbo.