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Joint Legal Actions

 

In Spain, there´s no possibility for individuals to start a proceeding by a Joint Legal Action. The Spanish Litigation Code only allows consumers associations to start them.

For proceedings in which consumers are involved, the Consumers Associations are allowed to defend their associates’ rights and also consumers’ rights in general.

Individuals must file their own lawsuits.

It´s possible that many people submit one lawsuit, but in this case, we can´t consider it as a joint legal action. There would be as many actions as the number of people involved, but it would not be a joint legal action. The most important difference between that possibility and the joint legal actions is that, if one of the claimants finally gives up, the rest of the claimants won´t be affected by this decision.

In many cases, it´s possible to join proceedings. In those cases, there would be several linked proceedings. For example, when one person´s act has generated damage to several people, it is possible to gather all those proceedings into just one. Joining those proceedings implies that the judgment will go in the same direction for all the people involved.