The Ministry of Justice has prepared a bill raising criminal court fees by up to six times, marking the first rate adjustment since 2004 to reflect current economic conditions. <\/p>\n
Fees incurred by convicted persons will increase by up to six times under a bill prepared by the Ministry of Justice, raising the highest rate from 1,000 PLN to 6,000 PLN. The changes also encompass fees for filing motions with the court and requesting judgment justifications.<\/p>\n
The draft bill amending the Act on Fees in Criminal Cases (UD444) has been added to the legislative work schedule of the Council of Ministers, with the goal of making fee amounts realistic and adapting them to current economic conditions. The last rate change was introduced in 2003 and has been in effect since January 14, 2004, when the minimum wage was 800 PLN compared to 4,806 PLN as of January 1, 2026.<\/p>\n
The ministry notes that current fees, often amounting to several dozen PLN, do not correspond to the actual costs of criminal proceedings, which include prisoner transport, court systems, and clerical support. Consequently, the State Treasury currently bears the entire cost of proceedings rather than the convicted individuals.<\/p>\n
When issuing a conviction, the court imposes an obligation on the convicted person to pay a specific amount based on the type and severity of the penalty. The draft provides for significant increases in fees paid by convicted persons depending on the imposed prison sentence.<\/p>\n
Fees associated with fines are set to change to 10 percent of the fine, but not less than 200 PLN, up from the current minimum of 30 PLN. Additionally, fees for numerous motions filed during proceedings or sentence execution will rise to 200 PLN, while the fee for a motion to reopen proceedings will increase to 500 PLN from 150 PLN.<\/p>\n
The ministry is introducing a new 100 PLN fee for requests to prepare and serve justifications for judgments to curb the misuse of such requests. The fee will not be charged if a discontinuance decision contains a protective measure ruling, and it will be refunded if an appeal is entirely or partially successful.<\/p>\n
The draft also increases fees for conditional discontinuances of proceedings, unsuccessful appeals by defendants, specific fees incurred by subsidiary or private prosecutors, the issuance of certificates and other documents from case files, and misdemeanor proceedings.<\/p>\n
The bill has been entered into the legislative works list of the Council of Ministers under number UD444, with the planned adoption by the Council of Ministers scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Ministry of Justice has prepared a bill raising criminal court fees by up to six times, marking the first rate adjustment since 2004 to reflect current economic conditions. Substantial Increases in Convicted Persons’ Fees Fees incurred by convicted persons will increase by up to six times under a bill prepared by the Ministry of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-and-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18861\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bizonews.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}