Lawyer Gu Dongling

1. explicitly proposed to the company to terminate the franchise contract, requiring the company to refund the franchise fee as soon as possible.

If you decide not to do it, you should inform the company as soon as possible without delay, and when you put forward it, you should clearly inform the company to cancel the contract, not to apply for cancellation or refund, but to inform.

After signing the contract, many franchisees clearly know that there are certain problems in the company or project, but they are lucky. They always feel that the company will not cheat, have unrealistic illusions about the company, fail to propose to the company to cancel the contract in time, and miss the critical period of safeguarding rights. Because the contract is not terminated, franchisees can easily miss the cooling-off period. If it is a regional agent, it will occupy the company's regional agent quota during this period, and it will also affect the refund ratio to a certain extent. Some franchisees know that there are problems with the company and the project, but they also ask the company to understand the contract, but instead of informing the company to cancel the contract, they apply to the company for cancellation. Then they have been delayed by the company under the pretext of leaders' meetings and business trips, and some have even been fooled by the company to write a written application for a refund, leaving evidence against them.

2. The evidence of termination must be kept, which can be a written termination notice or a WeChat chat record.

Many franchisees just told the company orally or directly by telephone that they didn't want to do it, and there was no evidence of such communication. It was delayed by the company for a lot of time before they reacted to defend their rights. At this time, there is no evidence to prove that they have proposed to terminate the contract, which adds a lot of difficulty to safeguarding rights. The safest way is to send a written notice of contract termination to the company through postal ems, and indicate on the courier that this is a notice of contract termination, keep the courier, and send the notice of contract termination to all employees of the company through WeChat.

3. After the termination of the contract, we should actively discuss with the company the issue of refunding the franchise fee (key point, key point, key point of preventing the second pit).

After notifying the company to terminate the contract, we should actively contact the company to discuss the refund. When talking, don't say it's because of lack of funds, withdrawal of partners, etc., but from the problems of the company and the project itself, euphemistically express that you don't know enough about the project prospect and the strength of the company, think that the company has false propaganda and misleading, and then put forward the rationality of refund in combination with the cooling-off period.

In the process of negotiation, we must control the time and not be delayed by the company.

When franchisees ask the company for a refund, the company's delaying tactics are nothing more than two kinds. One is that the leader is on a business trip and won't come back until next week or next month, and can't give an answer until the leader comes back; The other is that the company helps to transfer the franchise quota, and then the franchise fee will be refunded after the transfer is successful. In fact, if you think about it carefully, the above two statements are full of loopholes.

First of all, the leader is on a business trip. Does the company not go to work? Leaders can't handle problems through convenient communication methods such as telephone and WeChat? Must go back to the company to deal with it? No Therefore, franchisees used to talk about refunds. If the other party uses this excuse to prevaricate, it can basically be judged that the company has no sincerity in reconciliation, and it is nothing more than stalling for time until the end of the cooling-off period.

Second, the company helps to transfer the number of franchisees. If the company is willing to refund, it can completely terminate the contract, recover the number of franchisees, and then attract investment separately. Why do you want to help franchisees transfer? This is the trick.

(1) verbally promised to help transfer the quota, but actually there was no action at all. This is easy to understand. When franchisees come to negotiate, the company will definitely give priority to recommending blank markets. First, in order to open the market and win new customers, priority will definitely be given to winning new customers. Second, the original franchisee has signed the contract and paid the fee. Whether the fee can be refunded or not is entirely in the hands of the company.

(2) Some companies will sign entrustment transfer agreements with franchisees. The agreement stipulates that the company will take back the number of franchisees and the company will be responsible for transferring them to the third party. After the transfer, the company will charge a part of the handling fee, and the remaining joining fee will be returned to the franchisee. This road is a pit in a pit. Think about it, what did the franchisee get after signing this agreement? I have nothing. The qualification for joining is gone, and the joining fee is not obtained. After the successful transfer of the company, a part of the handling fee will be deducted. If the transfer of the company is unsuccessful, the company is not responsible. After the cooling-off period, or after the expiration of the contract, the company will simply say "no one wants it, it can't be transferred". What can franchisees do?

Seize the time to prevent some franchisees from delaying time, because the longer the delay, the better for franchisees. General franchisees will ask franchisees to write an application for franchise fee refund first, and wait for the approval of the leaders; It may also mean that the joining fee is not refundable, but it can help the transfer. If you have a next home, you can quit and so on. It is possible to wait all the time and miss the best time to sue.

4. If the company explicitly refuses to refund, then the franchisee should recover the joining fee through legal channels as soon as possible.

Evidence required for prosecution:

(1) The prosecution needs to provide franchise contracts, receipts, transfer records, etc. , to prove that there is a franchise relationship with the company and the relevant funds have been paid.

(2) If the company has false propaganda, it needs to provide company brochures, WeChat chat records, telephone recordings, etc.

(3) If the company has no franchise for filing, it is required to provide a screenshot of the filing inquiry of official website of the Ministry of Commerce.

(4) If the company doesn't have a trademark, you need to provide a screenshot of the official website query of the Trademark Office.

(5) Whether there are other losses (such as rent, decoration expenses, publicity expenses, employee salaries, etc.). ), you need to provide the corresponding contract, payment voucher and invoice.

Time to sue for rights protection:

According to the regulations, the trial period of civil litigation is generally six months, and the trial period of second instance is generally three months, in which the delivery time and appraisal time are not counted. Moreover, because the number of cases in different courts is quite different, the time of handling cases is not the same. As far as Guangzhou is concerned, it is normal for four or five months or even longer from filing a case to hearing and getting the first-instance judgment. If the defendant needs to make an announcement, it will be increased by 45 days (announcement period is 30 days+defense period/appeal period is 15 days).

Due to the complexity of legal procedures and the fact that the other party often has perennial legal counsel as a company, the design of various materials is more beneficial to it. When appearing in court, the franchisee is likely to entrust a lawyer to appear in court. As a weak party, it is best to entrust a lawyer to represent you and strive to protect your legal rights to the greatest extent.