New edition of the Law on Citizens' and Legal Entities' Appeals

The new version of the Law on Appeals entered into force on January 23, 2016.

The Law on Appeals lists specific legal relations to which its provisions do not apply. Thus, the Law on Appeals does not apply to appeals to be considered in accordance with the legislation on constitutional proceedings, civil, civil procedural, economic procedural, criminal procedural legislation, legislation defining the procedure for administrative proceedings, and legislation on administrative procedures. In addition, paragraph 1 of Article 2 of the Law is supplemented with an indication of its non-application to appeals of employees to the employer.

The Law on Appeals details the procedure for personal reception, including the procedure for refusing an applicant a personal reception. In particular, paragraph 2 of Article 6 provides that only officials of such an organization conducting personal reception may refuse a personal reception when addressing issues within the competence of the organization.

The Law on Appeals is also supplemented with an indication that not only officials of organizations conducting personal reception, but also employees of organizations authorized to carry out preliminary registration for personal reception, may refuse personal reception or registration for personal reception. This will simplify the procedure for organizing and conducting personal reception.

In this case, refusal of personal reception or registration for personal reception is allowed only on the grounds specified in the second to fifth paragraphs of paragraph 2 of Article 6 of the Law on Appeals:
— appeals on issues not related to the competence of theseorganizations;
— addressing issues on non-working days and hours;
— when the applicant has already received a comprehensive answer to their questions during a personal meeting;
— when correspondence with the applicant on the issues raised in the appeal has been terminated.

The Law on Appeals no longer specifies the need to explain the procedure for appealing decisions to leave appeals without substantive consideration.

In accordance with Part 3 of Clause 1 of Article 18 of the Law on Appeals, an explanation of the procedure for appealing responses to appeals is provided only if written responses to written appeals contain decisions to fully or partially refuse to satisfy the appeals.

To ensure conditions for comprehensive consideration of appeals, the Law on Appeals establishes the calculation of the following deadlines in working days:
— a five-day period for sending an appeal for consideration to organizations in accordance with their competence and notifying applicants, or for leaving the appeal without substantive consideration and notifying applicants about it, explaining which organization and in what order they should apply to resolve the issues set out in the appeals (Part one of Clause 3 of Article 10 of the Law on Appeals);
— a five-day period for returning written appeals that challenge court decisions to applicants, explaining to them the procedure for appealing court decisions (Part two of Clause 3 of Article 10 of the Law on Appeals);
— a five-day period for sending appeals containing information about an impending, ongoing, or completed crime or other offense to the relevant law enforcement or other state bodies (Clause 5 of Article 10 of the Law on Appeals);
— a five-day period for notifying the applicant of leaving the appeal without substantive consideration (Clause 4 of Article 15 of the Law on Appeals);
— a three-day period for reporting to the higher organization on execution.

An important way to ensure procedural economy and prevent abuse of the right to appeal is the possibility

cessation of correspondence with the applicant on repeated appeals. In this regard, the scope of cases where an appeal is left without substantive consideration, as a basis for terminating correspondence on repeated appeals, has been supplemented with a reference to the third and fourth paragraphs of paragraph 1 of Article 15 of the Law on Appeals, which will allow for the termination of correspondence with applicants who repeatedly submit repeated appeals that are outside the organization's competence.

The definition of the term "repeated appeal" has been significantly supplemented. In accordance with paragraph 12 of Article 1 of the new version of the Law on Appeals, a repeated appeal is a written or electronic appeal received from the same applicant on the same issue to the same organization, including those sent from other organizations, or a remark and/or suggestion entered into the book of remarks and suggestions by the same applicant on the same issue to the same individual entrepreneur, received within three years from the date of receipt of the initial appeal by the organization or individual entrepreneur, if the applicant was given a response (sent a notification) to the initial appeal.

The following points can be noted as novelties of this definition:
— an appeal can only be recognized as repeated within three years from the date of receipt of the initial appeal;
— an appeal is repeated not only if it is received by the same organization, but also if it is redirected by competence from other organizations;
— an appeal is repeated only if a response (notification) was sent to the initial appeal. This definition corresponds to the amendments and additions made to paragraph 1 of Article 13 of the Law on Appeals regarding the submission of several identical or clarifying appeals.

Recently, cases have become widespread in practice when citizens, when submitting appeals, indicate invalid data about the applicant (non-existent addresses, full names and addresses of other citizens, etc.), which leads to a broad consideration of effectively anonymous appeals. Especially thischaracteristic of the electronic обращения (appeals) system.

In order to exclude similar situations, the Law on Appeals proposes to recognize as anonymous not only appeals in which the citizen's surname, first name, patronymic (if any) or initials, or the address of their place of residence (place of stay), or the name of the legal entity (full or abbreviated) or its location are not indicated, but also appeals in which the specified data do not correspond to reality.

The rights of applicants have been expanded.

According to paragraph 4 of Article 7 of the new version of the Law on Appeals, applicants are granted the right to submit additional documents and (or) information or to request their retrieval, including in electronic form.

Such an innovation in some cases will contribute to the promptness and efficiency of considering appeals.

Paragraph three of Article 8 of the new version of the Law on Appeals establishes the applicant's obligation to submit appeals to organizations, individual entrepreneurs in accordance with their competence.

In the new version of the Law on Appeals, the rights of organizations and individual entrepreneurs are enshrined in Article 8-1.

Currently, organizations and individual entrepreneurs have the right:
— to request, in the prescribed manner, documents and (or) information necessary for resolving issues set forth in the appeals;
— to apply to the court to recover from applicants the expenses incurred in connection with the consideration of systematically sent (three or more times within a year) unfounded appeals to the same organization, to the same individual entrepreneur from the same applicant, as well as appeals containing knowingly false information;

The new version of the Law on Appeals allows for the recovery of expenses incurred by organizations in connection with the consideration of unfounded appeals.

According to Article 19 of the Law, this is possible in connection with:
— the consideration of systematically sent (three or more times within a year) unfounded appeals to the same organization, to the sameto the same individual entrepreneur from the same applicant;
— consideration of applications containing knowingly false information.

In this case, the following expenses may be recovered from the applicants:
— amounts payable to experts and other specialists involved in the consideration of applications;
— postal expenses;
— expenses related to travel to the place of consideration of the application;
— other expenses, except for the payment of working time of employees considering applications.

The list of expenses related to the consideration of applications is not exhaustive. Recovery of incurred expenses from applicants is carried out in court.

Paragraph 1 of Article 24 of the Law on Applications grants the right to leave remarks and (or) proposals made in the book of remarks and proposals, which do not relate to the activities of the organization, individual entrepreneur, and do not concern the quality of goods produced (sold), works performed, services rendered, without substantive consideration and without notifying the applicant thereof.

Assistant to the Vitebsk Transport Prosecutor
Yanchilenko. E. V.