Puterea doveditoare a înscrisului sub semnătură privată
The probative force of the document under private signature

Summary/Abstract: The probative force of the document under private signature derives from the signature of the party or, as the case may be, of the parties. The signature of a document guarantees in full faith, until proved otherwise, the existence of the consent of the party that has signed it with regard to its content. In case of the document under private signature the presumption of authenticity will no longer operate. The person to whom it is opposed a document under private signature is obliged either to acknowledge, or to contest the writing or the signature, because, until it is voluntarily acknowledged or verified in court, one can not know whether the signature belongs or not to the person who appears in the document as signatory and whether or not he has knowledge of the content of the document. The document under private signature, acknowledged by the opposing party or considered by the law as acknowledged, makes proof between the parties until proved otherwise, including with regard to the mentions in the document which are directly related to the legal relation between the parties. On the other hand, the mentions in the document not related to the content of the legal relation between the parties can serve only as prima facie written evidence. The attitude of the party, to whom it is opposed a document under private signature, not to protest against the use of that document or not to give an opinion in one sense or the other, is presumed to be a tacit acknowledgment. In case the writing or the signature has been contested by the party or declared unknown by its heirs or successors in rights, the court will proceed to the verification of the document according to the provisions of Articles 301–303 of the Civil Procedure Code. However, if the party claims that the document has been forged after signing, by erasures, additions or corrections in its content, or that the document contains an intellectual forgery, the party in question will be able to denounce the document as false, by means of the procedure regulated by Articles 304–308 of the Civil Procedure Code. The document not signed by the parties or by one of the parties is not valid as instrumentum probationis, but the legal operation (negotium iuris) remains valid and can be proved by other means of evidence, if the written form is not required by law ad validitatem. Even the document not valid as document under private signature is worth as prima facie written evidence, if it is opposed to the party who wrote it. The documents under private signature (signed) for which the formality „plurality of copies” or, where appropriate, the formality „good and approved” has not been accomplished is always worth as prima facie written evidence. In the relations between professionals it is recognized the probative force of a document not signed, but commonly used in the exercise of the activity of an enterprise in order to establish a legal act, unless the law imposes the written form in order to prove the legal act itself. The date indicated in the document under private signature has the same probative value, in the relations between the parties, with the other mentions in the document. Against third parties, the date of the document under private signature, by itself, is not evidence. Only the certain date is opposable to third parties, a date obtained by one of the methods established in Article 278 of the Civil Procedure Code or by other means provided by law.

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