Algerian law provides both criminal and civil penalties for operators that are considered to commit a fraud during a commercial transaction.

In fact, it is not rare that foreign and local companies may have a sale contract with a buyer or contractor who does not show any signs of unreliability at the early stage, but by the time comes the payment, it appears that the latter is a fraudster or commits a fraud.

Actually, according to the Executive Decree n° 13-84 laying down the arrangements for organizing and managing the national fraudster file, and the Law n°18-18 ( budget law of 2019), the fraud or the fraudulent acts are characterized by fraudulent procedures carried out, voluntarily, with the aim of evading, in whole or in part, the duties or for obtaining, unduly, any advantage and intended to give the appearance of sincerity to actually inaccurate statements. 

Indeed, according to the Algerian Law, the fraudsters are the ones who committed serious infringements with the tax, commercial, customs, banking and financial laws and regulations as well as the lack of legal deposit of the balance sheet. Thus, the fraudsters are listed within a national file called FNF “Fichier National des Fraudeurs”.

The National Fraudsters File, managed by the services of the General Department of Taxes, is supplied by the authorized services of Customs, Taxes, Commerce and the Central Bank of Algeria. 

The database of the file is transmitted, at each update, to the tax services and the Customs for the follow-up of the domiciliation of foreign trade operations; public procurement tenders; request for tax, customs and commercial benefits; administrative facilitation and issuance of tax status attestations; etc. 

Furthermore, in the absence of regularization of their situation, these companies are excluded from foreign trade operations and from submission to public contracts.

However, despite the previous mentioned means, implemented by the authorities, in order to frame this kind of behaviors, and discourage fraudsters, foreign exporters still face the issue of no payment.

Meanwhile, if a Seller ever faced this kind of situation, in dealing with a defaulting buyer in Algeria, there is a fast procedure aiming to recover the due amount. Indeed, Seller can seek for a debt recovery, if the debt fulfils the required conditions (a determined amount, due, payable and ascertained in writing). 

Here, the first solution is to go before the Court for a payment injunction, where the judge issues an order to the debtor to proceed with the recovery of his debt within a deadline.