Recent Development
The Electronic Notification Regulation (“Regulation“) has been published in the Official Gazette dated 6 December 2018. The Regulation regulates the principles and the procedure for the electronic notifications that will be made by authorities through Posta ve Telgraf Teşkilatı (“PTT“), the national post and telegraph directorate of Turkey, in accordance with Notification Law No. 7201 (“Notification Law“). The Regulation will enter into force on 1 January 2019.
What’s new?
a.Persons and institutions that are required to serve through electronic notification
According to the Regulation, serving through electronic notification is mandatory for the persons and institutions listed below:
- All private legal entities, including those established by law
- Other associations having more than 50% of their capital belonging to the public
- Attorneys registered with the bar
- Intermediators and experts registered in the registry
- Notaries
- Certain general budget administrations, special budget administrations, regulatory and supervisory authorities, and social security institutions that are listed in the annexes of Public Finance Management and Control Law No. 5018 (“Law No. 5018“)
- Local administrations defined in Law No. 5018
- Other public institutions and organizations established by special law and funds established by law and surety chambers
- Public economic enterprises and their subsidiaries and enterprises
- Professional organizations and their superior organizations that qualify as public institutions
- Institutions of persons that are authorized to represent (i) administrations, (ii) public economic enterprises and (iii) other associations having more than 50% of their capital belonging to public, (iv) judicial and administrative authorities, (v) execution directorates, and (vi) arbitrators
b.Obtaining an electronic notification address
It is mandatory for the persons and institutions listed above to obtain an electronic notification address via an application to PTT. This application must be made within one month as of the enforcement date, 1 January 2019.
Any person that is not listed above may obtain an electronic notification address from PTT upon request. In this case, electronic notification will become mandatory for these persons as well.
c.Preparing the electronic notification and serving it to the addressee
The serving authority will prepare the electronic notification and then deliver it to the National Electronic Notification System (Ulusal Elektronik Tebligat Sistemi — “UETS“). UETS will timestamp and encode the relevant electronic notification for confidentiality purposes, and then deliver it to the addressee’s electronic notification address.
The electronic notification shall be deemed to have been made at the end of the fifth day following the day it was delivered to the addressee.
UETS keeps records of the delivery information of electronic notifications; whether and when they were delivered. UETS is obliged to inform the serving party accordingly. These records are called “evidence records” (delil kayıt) and qualify as conclusive evidence.
Conclusion
As of 1 January 2019, electronic notifications will be mandatory for the persons and institutions listed above. Therefore, these persons will have to apply to PTT and follow the procedures set forth in the Regulation in order to obtain an electronic notification address.
