Electronic legal transactions (the ERV system)

How does electronic legal transactions in the justice system work? What submissions can be made?

All initial and subsequent submissions (initial claims/complaints, responses, applications, pleadings, appeals, statements of claim, etc.) and any enclosures can be transmitted to and received from Austrian courts and public prosecutors’ offices electronically and securely via the justice system's electronic communications system, known as the ERV (note that public prosecutors can only receive initial submissions electronically).

There are usually two ways to use the ERV system:

• Via document centres
• Via JustizOnline

Using ERV through document centres

ERV users can (and, in some cases, must) submit documents electronically to the court or the public prosecutor's offices via document centres. Anyone can use this service, but they need to register with a document centre to do so.

Certain institutions are required to use the ERV system for legal correspondence. Users of the service pay a flat fee to the document centre, as well as fees for each individual transmission. Communication with service users is exclusively by electronic means.

The following categories of people/entities are required to use the service:

• Legal representatives and defence counsels in criminal cases
• Notaries
• Credit and financial institutions
• Austrian insurance companies
• Social security bodies
• Pension institutions, the Construction Workers’ Leave and Severance Pay Fund, the Pharmaceutical Salary Fund, the Insolvency Compensation Fund, IEF-Service GmbH
• The umbrella organisation for social security bodies
• The office of the Lawyer and Legal Advisor to the Republic of Austria
• Bar associations

Further Links

Document centres - electronic legal transactions (→ BMJ)^{German text}

Using ERV trough JustizOnline

The JustizOnline (→ BMJ)^{German text} portal enables any citizen to use their ID Austria to submit documents to the courts or public prosecutors' offices electronically. Unlike with document centres, electronic communications via the upload service are one-way only - replies will not be sent electronically through the service. Uploading documents on the portal is free of charge.

Further links

• Federal Ministry of Justice (→ BMJ)^{German text}
• Edict file(→ BMJ)^{German text}
• Electronic submissions to courts and public prosecutor's offices (→ BMJ)^{German text}
• Electronic legal transactions (→ BMJ)^{German text}

Legal bases

Verordnung der Bundesministerin für Justiz über den elektronischen Rechtsverkehr