Our German member works in a lawfirm dedicated to fight the lack of transparency in banks and its consequences for clients. He tells us all about his work.
Can you tell us about your lawfirm ?
Back when it was created in 1976 by Christian Rossner, ours was the first lawfirm in Germany to specialise in banking and capital market law. At the time, we called that protection for investors, but this field has now broadened into other cases and we can now act on pretty much any conflict you might have with your bank.
I personally entered the firm in 1994 as a young lawyer, and within a few years I specialised in that field too.
What is the skill you use the most?
All of us in this firm are proud to say we provide a very detailed, very personalised strategy to every client.
We only take a case if we can win it. That may sound normal to you but we are sad to report that a lot of lawyers in Germany would take you to court against your bank even if they knew there was little chance of success, because they would get paid anyway! We are definitely against this; we craft a tailor-made analysis of the case and tell clients if they have a chance or not. Every client wants to hear that they will win the case, but we prefer to tell them they won't before they lose than afterwards!
We also pride ourselves on our transparency.
What do you mean by transparency?
This takes two forms.
First, we are transparent towards the client because they will be provided with our entire strategy, in every detail, and that includes the cost. They also are provided with an explanation of the whole legal basis: they have to understand what is going on, so that they can make their own informed decisions.
Second, we fight against the lack of transparency of some banks. They like to sell you products with a very good name, something that sounds very nice but actually carries a big risk. They typically try to hide the risk their clients will take. So we analyse their products and we find out how they work, their structures, the real odds. And then, we sue them for lack of transparency, in the hopes that their future products will be presented in a more accurate way.
The lack of transparency is the reason why clients bought a product they thought would be good for them but in the end is only good for the bank. Fighting against this is our daily job!
