Two Forums Study Efficiency of Commercial Registration at Regional Level

01.12.2009

In 2009 the American Chamber of Commerce in Bulgaria implemented a project on improving of the commercial registration, funded by Fund Bulgaria and Balkan Trust for Democracy. The chamber partnered with other business associations: the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Bulgarian Industrial Association and the Confederation of Employers and Industrialists in Bulgaria, each of them bringing to the table specific issues and contributing to the outreach.

In June 2009 the chamber organized a conference entitled “Efficiency and Accountability of the Commercial Register in Bulgaria” held in Sofia. The conference was the first public forum with broad participation aiming to discuss the effectiveness and efficiency of the commercial registration since its launch in 2007.

Consequently two round tables on the issues of commercial registration were organized: one in Varna (October 28, 2009), and one in Stara Zagora (November 20, 2009). Closing event to evaluate what was achieved would be held in Sofia in the beginning of 2010.

“The Project has established a new level of communication between the business and the Agency and all issues discussed will be subject to thorough consideration. As for Varna region, the local administration employees are not very much aware of the opportunities the Register provides. For example, instead of consulting with the data base of the Register, they prefer to check daily with the Registry Agency”, Silva Krikorian, regional director of the Commercial Register in Varna said.

The round table in Varna gathered 50 representatives of the local business who conferred with Silva Krikorian, regional director of the Commercial Register about the registration problems. Approximately 18.3-percent of the firms are not aware that there is a 25-percent discount off the fee if an electronic form for registration of a company is submitted, showed the results of a second Market Links survey “Measures to Improve the Commercial Register Work”, arranged by the chamber. The October survey summarized data of 90 respondents among AmCham members.

The attorney Vladimir Penkov with “Penkov, Markov&Partners presented a legal analysis of the commercial registration process by pointing at four groups of issues that impede the proper implementation of the reform:

Incomplete legal regulation system (lack of trade mark protection, lack of protection of personal data); insufficient or irrelevant legal regulation (registration forms on behalf of third authorized persons are not allowed; controversial or illegitimate practice (the administration still requires repeated presentation of documents); need to improve technically the registration process (removing the unnecessary fields in the registration form and simplification).

Proposals and measures for improving the commercial registration and ways to overcome gaps and clumsy procedures were discussed at the round table held in Stara Zagora on Nov. 20, 2009. Fifty local business reps discussed the issues with legal advisers and businesses associations: Oleg Popov, BCCI-Stara Zagora, Valentin Georgiev, AmCham Bulgaria, attorney Vladimir Penkov, Kaloyan Popov, Market Links agency, Alexander Ivanov, Project Coordiantor.

“Effective and long-lasting contacts should be created between the Commercial Register and the businesses. The next step would be connecting the Register with the other registers in Bulgaria, and afterwards with the EU registers, Boyan Terziev, Registry Agency, Stara Zagora said.
In the opinion of the businesses, the authorities still neglect the trade marks protection as was the case in the beginning of the democratic changes 20 years ago. At that time Bulgaria lost significant company names as “Balkan”, “Bulgarplod”, and quite a number of popular Bulgarian cigarettes blends. Approximately 15-20-percent of the registered Bulgarian firms in the Commercial Register have similar names, and unscrupulous business persons appropriate another names.

Vladimir Penkov said that amendments to the Commercial Register Act would be proposed soon to reps of the Bulgarian Parliament. He suggested when a majority owner of a company is disqualified, this should happen only under the court jurisdiction, as well as the association statutes and protocols of the general assemblies have to be certified by a notary in order to avoid frauds.