Getting Paid in Latvia: Unpaid Invoices, Interest, and the Courts

A customer has not paid. Latvian law gives you two things immediately and without asking: interest at 8 percentage points over the base rate, and EUR 40 of recovery costs. Neither needs to be in your contract.

What it gives you after that is a choice between two routes with very different prices. A documented invoice under EUR 15,000 can go through the warning procedure, where the state fee on a five-thousand-euro debt is EUR 100. The same debt as an ordinary claim costs EUR 300. Most founders reach for the second because it is the one they have heard of.

This guide covers what you can add to the invoice, which route fits which debt, what each costs, and the point below which the arithmetic says to stop.

This states the rules with a link to each. It is written for a Latvian company chasing a business customer on an unpaid invoice. It is not advice, and it is not about your own company's debts: if you cannot pay what you owe, the liquidation guide covers closing properly, the insolvency guide covers what happens when a company cannot pay at all, and a company already in that position needs an adviser before it needs a web page.

What Can You Do When a Latvian Customer Does Not Pay?

Three things, in order of cost. Add the interest and recovery costs the law already gives you. Then, if the debt is documented and under EUR 15,000, apply for the warning procedure, which is cheap and needs no hearing. An ordinary court claim is the last of the three, not the first.

The order matters because each step is cheaper than the one after it, and because the earlier ones often end the problem on their own. A customer who has been slow rather than unwilling tends to pay once a real number with a legal basis lands in their inbox.

• Restate the debt with what the law adds. Interest and recovery costs apply whether or not your contract mentions them. Both are below.
• The warning procedure. A court sends the debtor a warning; if they do not object, you get an enforceable decision. No hearing, no evidence, a small fixed fee.
• An ordinary claim. A real case, with a real fee and real time. This is where a disputed debt has to go, because the cheaper route collapses the moment the debtor objects.

What Interest Can You Charge on a Late Invoice in Latvia?

8 percentage points above the base rate, on any contract for the supply of goods, a purchase, or the provision of services. The base rate is the European Central Bank's last main refinancing rate before the half-year began, so the figure resets twice a year rather than moving daily. For the second half of 2026 it is 2.65%, which makes the statutory rate 8 percentage points on top of that. The calculator below adds the two for you, and lets you enter a different base rate for a debt that ran over an earlier half-year.

This is section 1759 of the Civil Law, and the important part for a founder is that it is automatic. You do not need an interest clause. A contract that is silent on late payment still carries this rate, because the statute supplies it.

A contract can agree a different rate. Where it does, the agreed rate governs and this one does not apply. Read your own terms before quoting the statutory figure at anyone.

Can You Charge the Cost of Chasing the Debt?

Yes, EUR 40, and the statute says it is owed without a separate reminder. It applies to late payment on a contract for the supply of goods, a purchase, or the provision of services, which covers most of what a startup invoices for.

It is a floor and not a cap. The same article says that paying it does not release the debtor from compensating the rest of the loss you actually suffered, including the costs of litigation. The EUR 40 is what you get for nothing; anything above it you have to prove.

What Is the Warning Procedure, and When Does It Fit?

It is a court-run demand. You file an application, the court sends the debtor a warning, and if they do not object within the period you get a decision you can enforce. There is no hearing and no weighing of evidence, which is what keeps it cheap.

Latvian law calls it saistību piespiedu izpildīšana brīdinājuma kārtībā, and it sits in chapter 50.1 of the Civil Procedure Law. It is built for exactly the case a startup has: a payment obligation evidenced by a document, whose due date has passed.

It also covers a payment agreed in a contract for the supply of goods, a purchase or the provision of services even where no due date was set, as long as a document evidences it. An invoice with no payment terms is not outside the procedure.

The trade is that it decides nothing. If the debtor objects, the procedure ends there and you are back to an ordinary claim, having spent the fee. It is a filter for debts that are not really disputed, not a way to win an argument.

When Is the Warning Procedure Not Available?

Seven situations rule it out, and three of them catch founders regularly: a debt over EUR 15,000, a contractual penalty above 10% of the principal, and a debtor whose declared or legal address is outside Latvia. The others are narrower.

The full list in section 406.1 excludes:

• Payments tied to counter-performance you have not delivered. If the customer's defence is that you did not finish the work, this is not the route.
• A debtor with no declared address, or whose declared address or legal address is not in Latvia. A foreign customer is out, and the EU route below is the answer instead.
• A contractual penalty above 10% of the principal debt. Worth reading against your own terms: a penalty clause written to be frightening can cost you the cheap route.
• Interest claimed above the principal debt. Old debts fail this one.
• A debt above EUR 15,000.
• Joint and several obligations, where more than one debtor is liable together.

What Does It Cost to Take an Unpaid Invoice to a Latvian Court?

The state fee is a fixed amount from a table, not a percentage. Since 1 April 2025 the scale runs upward in bands from EUR 80 at the bottom. The band covering a five-thousand-euro invoice costs EUR 300, whichever way the case goes.

This replaced a percentage calculation, and guidance written before April 2025 describes a system that no longer exists. The current scale is annex 3 to the Civil Procedure Law.

The warning procedure has its own, much shorter scale. On that same five-thousand-euro invoice the fee is EUR 100, against EUR 300 for an ordinary claim on the same money. That gap is the whole argument for trying the cheap route first where the debt qualifies.

Neither figure includes a lawyer, and neither is the end of the cost. Winning gets you a judgment; collecting on it is a separate process with a bailiff and its own charges.

What Is the Simplified Procedure?

A lighter track for small money claims. Where the principal debt is no more than EUR 3,000, the case is started on a written application and normally decided without a hearing, on the documents. It is an ordinary claim, so the ordinary fee scale applies.

Note the vocabulary. This used to be called maza apmēra prasības, small claims, and the law now calls it vienkāršotās procedūras lietas, simplified procedure cases. Older articles still use the retired term, which is a reliable sign of how old the rest of the advice is.

It differs from the warning procedure in what it does: the simplified procedure decides the dispute, the warning procedure only produces an order where nobody disputes anything.

How Long Do You Have to Sue on an Unpaid Invoice in Latvia?

3 years for a claim arising from a commercial transaction, unless another law sets a different period for that particular claim. That is the Commercial Law rule, and it is shorter than the general civil limitation period a founder who has read about Latvian contract law might reasonably assume applies here.

The practical consequence is that an invoice left in a folder for four years is not a debt you can enforce, however clearly it was owed. If you are going to chase something, the decision has a deadline attached to it.

Can You Use the Undisputed Enforcement Route on an Invoice?

Almost never. Saistību bezstrīdus piespiedu izpildīšana is faster still, but section 401 limits it to obligations recorded in particular instruments: a deed or contract drawn up or certified before a notary, a mortgage, a commercial pledge, a bill of exchange.

A plain invoice is not one of those, so the route that sounds fastest is usually closed. It matters at the moment you sign, not the moment you chase: an agreement put into notarial form carries an enforcement route that the same agreement on your own letterhead does not.

For most startup invoices, the warning procedure is the fast route, and this one is a reason to think about form on a large contract.

What If the Customer Is in Another EU Country?

Use the European Payment Order. The Latvian warning procedure is closed to you, because it requires the debtor's declared address or legal address to be in Latvia, so a debt owed from elsewhere in the union needs the EU instrument instead, under regulation 1896/2006.

The Civil Procedure Law recognises it directly: section 36.1 deals with the state fee on a European Payment Order application, and the regulation's own machinery handles service and objection. It works across member states without you having to sue in the customer's own courts first.

The mechanics resemble the Latvian warning procedure. It produces an order where the debtor does not object, and it collapses into ordinary proceedings where they do.

When Is an Unpaid Invoice Not Worth Chasing?

When the fee approaches the debt. The smallest ordinary-claim fee is EUR 80, which on a nine-hundred-euro invoice is most of a tenth of the money before anyone has spent an hour on it. The warning procedure changes that arithmetic and does not always rescue it.

Three things belong in the decision, and only one of them is the fee.

• Whether the debtor can pay at all. A judgment against an empty company is an expense, not an asset. The company's filed accounts are public and free, and every company page here carries what was last filed: turnover, profit, equity and staff. A customer whose last filing shows nothing is a customer whose judgment will show nothing.
• Whether the debt is actually disputed. If it is, the cheap route is closed and you are pricing an ordinary claim from the start.
• Whether you will still be dealing with them. The commercial answer and the legal answer are often different, and only you know which one you are buying.

The honest version is that below a few hundred euro the process costs more than the money, and the useful response is to change the terms you invoice on rather than to chase harder. An advance, a milestone, or a smaller first engagement prevents more of this than any procedure recovers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do you need an interest clause in your contract to charge late payment interest in Latvia?

No. The Civil Law supplies a rate of 8 percentage points over the base rate for contracts covering the supply of goods, a purchase, or the provision of services, whether or not the contract says anything. A contract that agrees a different rate displaces it, so read your own terms before relying on the statutory figure.

How much is the state fee to sue for an unpaid invoice in Latvia?

It is a fixed amount from a table rather than a percentage. The scale starts at EUR 80 for the smallest band, and the band covering a five-thousand-euro invoice costs EUR 300. The warning procedure has a separate and much cheaper scale for debts it covers.

Can you use the Latvian warning procedure against a foreign customer?

No. The procedure is unavailable where the debtor has no declared address, or where their declared address or legal address is outside Latvia. For a debtor elsewhere in the EU, the European Payment Order under regulation 1896/2006 does the equivalent job across borders.

How long do you have to chase an unpaid invoice in Latvia?

3 years for claims arising from a commercial transaction, unless another law sets a different period for the particular claim. The period runs from when the claim arose, so an invoice left unchased for several years can pass out of reach while it still looks collectable in your accounts.

What happens if the debtor objects to the warning procedure?

The procedure ends. It decides nothing and weighs no evidence, so an objection closes it and leaves you to start an ordinary claim, having already spent the application fee. That is the trade: it is cheap because it only works on debts nobody is really disputing.

Sources

• Civil Law, part four, law of obligations, for statutory late-payment interest and the recovery costs a late payer owes without being asked.
• Civil Procedure Law, for the warning procedure in chapter 50.1, undisputed enforcement in section 401, the simplified procedure, the European Payment Order fee in section 36.1, and the state fee scales in annex 3.
• Commercial Law, for the limitation period on claims arising from a commercial transaction.
• Regulation (EC) No 1896/2006, for the European order for payment procedure.