F.I.F.A. – Dispute Resolution Chamber / Camera di Risoluzione delle Controversie – solidarity contribution / contributo di solidarietà – (2020-2021) – fifa.com – atto non ufficiale – Decision 11 September 2020
Decision of the
Single Judge of the sub-committee of
The Dispute Resolution Chamber
passed on 11 September 2020
regarding solidarity contribution for the transfer of the player Carl Starfelt
BY:
Tomislav Kasalo (Croatia), Single Judge of the sub-committee of the Dispute Resolution Chamber
CLAIMANT:
IF Brommapojkarna, Sweden
RESPONDENT:
FC Rubin Kazan, Russia
I. FACTS OF THE CASE
Player: Carl Starfelt
Date of birth: 1 June 1995
Player passport: issued by the Svenska Fotbollförbundet on an unknown date
Season
Birthday
Club
Registration
Status
Category
2007-2018
12 - 23
IF Brommapojkarna
25.09.2007 - 11.01.2018
Amateur, Professional since 01.10.2013
II (2007,2009,2010,2019,2014,2018)
III (2008,2011,2012,2015,2017)
IV
(2016)
2018-2019
23 - 24
IFK Goteborg
12.01.2018 - 14.07.2019
Professional
II
Sporting season: Between 2005 and 2012: 15 November to 14 November
(Sweden) Since 15 November 2012: 1 January to 31 December
Date of transfer: 15 July 2019, IFK Goteborg (Sweden) to FC Rubin Kazan (Russia)
Financial conditions:
- Transfer fee of EUR 1,100,000 payable on 1 September 2019
- article 9 of the transfer agreement provided that “Solidarity contributions in amount of 5% of the transfer fee, provided by the RSTP, FC Rubin at its own costs (above any payments to [Goteborg]) shall distribute among clubs involved in a training of the Player in accordance with the Player’s passport provided by the [SVFF]”.
Claimant club: IF Brommapojkarna (Sweden)
Respondent club: FC Rubin Kazan (Russia)
Claim and Response:
1. On 29 May 2020, the Claimant lodged a claim with FIFA requesting the payment of EUR 47,562 as solidarity contribution in connection with the permanent transfer of the player from Goteborg to the Respondent, plus 5 % interests p.a. as of 15 August 2019.
2. The Claimant alleged having been contacted by the Respondent on 16 July 2019 on the following email address "madelene.sundin@brommapojkarna.se" in connection with the payment of the sum of EUR 47,562 due as solidarity contribution for the registration of the player with it.
3. The Claimant further sustained that, on the same day, i.e. 16 July 2019, it had replied to the Respondent using the same email address and requested the latter to provide its bank details in order to draft the corresponding invoice. According to the Claimant, the Respondent promptly submitted the requested information by email.
4. The Claimant maintained having provided the Respondent on 17 July 2019 with all the information needed by the latter in order to proceed with the payment in question.
5. The Claimant added that later on, the Respondent had alleged having paid the requested amount on 17 October 2019 using an invoice that it had received from the following email address: "madelene.sundin.brommapojkarna@gmx.se”.
6. The Claimant contested having received the aforementioned payment clarifying that it had never issued any other invoice but the one dated of 17 July 2019.
7. From, the Claimant’s point of view, should the Respondent have been victim of a scam and paid the requested amount to a different bank account, such payment should not have an impact on the amount due as it was not received by the Claimant.
8. On 6 July 2020, the FIFA administration made a proposal to the parties to the settle the matter suggesting that the Respondent should pay the Claimant the sum of EUR 50,160 as solidarity contribution, plus 5% interests p.a. as from the due date.
9. The proposal was accepted by the Claimant.
10. On 4 August 2020, the Respondent rejected the claim arguing that it had paid the Claimant EUR 47,652 on 18 October 2019 as solidarity contribution.
11. According to the Respondent, on 18 July 2019 and on 21 August 2019,it had received two additional invoices for the amount payable as solidarity contribution agreed with the Claimant from the email address "madelene.sundin.brommapojkarna@gmx.se".
12. The Respondent added that, initially, no payment could be made but that finally, after having received another invoice from the Claimant on 18 October 2019, the payment was accepted by the bank.
13. The last three invoices included three different bank details and mentioned the addresses of three banks located respectively in Austria, Mexico and the Netherlands.
14. The Respondent deemed having always acted in good faith.
15. Moreover, the Respondent was of the opinion that because it had received the Claimant’s first email on 16 July 2019 from the address "madelene.sundin@brommapojkarna.se" following its request to arrange the payment of the due solidarity contribution, the fraudulent sender must have had access to the Claimant's email address on its own domain, not the Respondent’s one.
16. In addition, the Respondent argued that all invoices submitted were "similar to each other, and all of them were drafted on the letterhead of the Claimant with official emblem of the Claimant" and therefore it could trust in good faith that it was paying to an account belonging to the Claimant.
17. Finally, the Respondent held not having received any email from the Claimant between 17 July and 27 November 2019 from the address "madelene.sundin@brommapojkarna.se" and therefore it was hard to believe that the latter, while waiting to receive the payment, refrained from sending any notification/reminder during that period of time.
II. LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS
Applicable law: RSTP: June 2019 edition.
Procedural Rules: 2019 edition.
Decision:
18. It is undisputed that, on 17 July 2019 the Claimant provided its banking details to the Respondent using the email address "madelene.sundin@brommapojkarna.se". It is also undisputed that only afterwards, the Respondent started exchanging emails with a different email address, i.e. “madelene.sundin.brommapojkarna@gmx.se”.
19. The Respondent did not seem to have undertaken any verification steps towards the Claimant intended at confirming whether this second email address belonged to it despite the relevant address looking less official than the first one and despite the fact that only the invoice provided with the first email address included a Swedish VAT Number, a Swedish IBAN number and SWIFT address as well as the Swedish address of a Swedish bank.
20. The Respondent does not seem to have contacted the Claimant either after having allegedly failed to pay the agreed amount using the invoices received with the second email address nor once the payment was finally made to a bank account situated outside Sweden to a non-Swedish bank.
21. As a result and on the basis of all of the aforementioned, the Respondent had not acted with due diligence by not taking the necessary precautionary steps to question the Claimant via any other communication channel as regards to the several payment attempts made as from 5 August until 18 October 2019, date of the effective payment.
22. Therefore, it remained undisputed that the Respondent failed to provide evidence that it had duly paid the agreed amount on the Claimant’s bank account, the details of which had been duly submitted to it by the latter on 17 July 2019. As such, the arguments of the Respondent were not acceptable due to its own lack of diligence and it had therefore failed to fulfil its obligations in accordance with Annexe 5 of the Regulations.
23. It is undisputed that according to the player passport issued by the SVFF, the player, born on 1 June 1995, was registered with the Claimant as from 25 September 2007 until 11 January 2018. As a result and in accordance with art. 1 of Annexe 5 of the Regulations, the Claimant would be entitled to receive solidarity contribution for said period.
24. As such, in principle, the Claimant would be entitled to receive, as solidarity contribution for the player, 86.64% of the 5% of the transfer compensation paid. In particular, the transfer compensation paid in casu amounted to EUR 1,100,000. Therefore, the Claimant would in principle be entitled to receive 86.64% of 5% of EUR 1,100,000, i.e. the amount of EUR 50,160.
25. However, the Claimant had claimed the amount of EUR 47,562 only. In application of the legal principle of non ultra petita, the Claimant is entitled to receive the sum of EUR 47,562 as solidarity contribution.
26. The Claimant is entitled to receive 5% interests p.a. as of 15 August 2019, i.e. as of the day after the due date of the payment of the transfer fee, 30 days after the registration + 1 day.
27. Art. 24 bis is applicable.
DECISION
1. The claim of the Claimant, IF Brommapojkarna, is accepted.
2. The Respondent, FC Rubin Kazan, shall pay to IF Brommapojkarna:
EUR 47,562 as solidarity contribution plus 5% interest p.a. as from 15 August 2019 until the date of effective payment.
3. The Respondent shall provide evidence of payment of the due amount in accordance with this decision to chhelpdesk@fifa.org, duly translated, if applicable, into one of the official FIFA languages (English, French, German, Spanish).
4. In the event that the amount due, plus interest as established above is not paid by the Respondent within 45 days, as from the notification by the Claimant of the relevant bank details to the Respondent, the following consequences shall arise:
1.
The Respondent shall be banned from registering any new players, either nationally or internationally, up until the due amount is paid and for the maximum duration of three entire and consecutive registration periods. The aforementioned ban mentioned will be lifted immediately and prior to its complete serving, once the due amount is paid.
(cf. art. 24bis of the Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players). 2.
In the event that the payable amount as per in this decision is still not paid by the end of the ban of three entire and consecutive registration periods, the present matter shall be submitted, upon request, to the FIFA Disciplinary Committee.
5. No procedural costs are payable (cf. arts. 17 par. 1 and 18 par. 1 of the Rules Governing the Procedure of the Players’ Status Committee and Dispute Resolution Chamber).
For the Single Judge of the sub-committee of the Dispute Resolution Chamber:
Emilio García Silvero
Chief Legal & Compliance Officer
NOTE RELATED TO THE APPEAL PROCEDURE:
Pursuant to article 58 paragraph 1 of the FIFA Statutes, this decision may be appealed before the Court of Arbitration for Sport within 21 days of notification.
NOTE RELATED TO PUBLICATION:
FIFA may publish this decision. For reasons of confidentiality, FIFA may decide, at the request of a party within five days of the notification of the motivated decision, to publish an anonymised or a redacted version (cf. article 20 of the Procedural Rules).
CONTACT INFORMATION:
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FIFA-Strasse 20 P.O. Box 8044 Zurich Switzerland
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