Three years, but the clock starts earlier than you think. Where a contract says payment is made „against an invoice“, the Grand Chamber of the Czech Supreme Court held that the three-year limitation period starts on the day you could first have issued the invoice. The due date printed on it postpones nothing. The Constitutional Court rejected that reading in September 2025, but the Supreme Court has not changed it. The conflict persists, and it is the creditor who delays who pays for it.
The general limitation period is three years (Section 629(1) of the Civil Code). It starts on the day the right „could first have been exercised“, and what matters is when you learned of the circumstances that allow you to exercise it (Section 619(1) and (2)). The whole dispute turns on one question: when could you first have asked to be paid?
According to the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court, no. Where the parties do not separately agree on the time of performance and the contract merely says that payment is made against an invoice issued by the creditor, the time of performance is left to the creditor's will (Section 1958(2)). In judgment file no. 31 Cdo 3125/2022 the Grand Chamber held that the three-year subjective limitation period under Section 629(1) starts running on the day the creditor learned, or should and could have learned, that the right to determine the time of performance had arisen, that is, the right to ask for payment „immediately“. The court based this on the principle that the law assists the vigilant. In practice the clock starts when you could have invoiced, and for a work contract the right to payment arises upon completion of the work (Section 2610(1)). Delay the invoice by six months and you have cut six months off your limitation period.
It took the opposite view. In its judgment of 3 September 2025, file no. IV. ÚS 778/25, it quashed a Supreme Court decision built on the Grand Chamber's reading and gave priority to the autonomy of the parties' will. Where the parties agreed that the creditor determines the due date by calling for payment, for example by invoicing, the claim was not due until then and could not be successfully pursued in court, so the limitation period could not start running. The Court concluded that, out of respect for the autonomy of the will, the constitutionally sound conclusion is that the limitation period starts not when the legal relationship arises, but when the claim falls due.
It has not, and that is the awkward part. On 10 February 2026, in decision file no. 23 Cdo 2613/2025, a three-judge chamber of the Supreme Court referred the same case to the Grand Chamber, because in the light of the Constitutional Court's judgment it had reached a differing view and held that the question „should be decided differently“. But by decision of 13 May 2026, file no. 31 Cdo 509/2026, the Grand Chamber refused the referral and sent the case back, holding that where a three-judge chamber is bound by a quashing judgment of the Constitutional Court, that is no ground for referring the case to the Grand Chamber, even if the resulting decision conflicts with an earlier Grand Chamber ruling. On the substance, therefore, the Grand Chamber has not changed its position, judgment 31 Cdo 3125/2022 still stands, and nobody has reconciled it with the Constitutional Court.
While the conflict lasts, do not rely on the more generous reading of the Constitutional Court. Agree the due date in the contract itself rather than by reference to an invoice: „the price is payable within 30 days of handover of the work“ is something quite different from „payment is made against the contractor's invoice“. With the first wording the time of performance is agreed and the dispute about the start of the limitation period never arises. Second, invoice as soon as the right to payment arises, not when it suits you. Third, count the three years from the earliest moment you could have asked to be paid, not from the date on the invoice. A creditor who counts from the due date and loses the case does not lose a few weeks, but the entire claim.
Source: Sections 619, 629, 1958(2) and 2610(1) of Act No. 89/2012 Coll., the Civil Code; judgment of the Supreme Court of 31 May 2023, file no. 31 Cdo 3125/2022 (Grand Chamber); judgment of the Constitutional Court of 3 September 2025, file no. IV. ÚS 778/25; decision of the Supreme Court of 10 February 2026, file no. 23 Cdo 2613/2025; decision of the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court of 13 May 2026, file no. 31 Cdo 509/2026.
The Civil Code builds the start of the limitation period on two rules. Under Section 619(1), for a right enforceable before a public authority the limitation period starts on the day the right could first have been exercised; under subsection (2), a right can first be exercised once the entitled person learned of the circumstances decisive for the start of the period, or should and could have learned of them. Alongside this three-year subjective period (Section 629(1)) runs an objective period of ten years from the day the property right fell due (Section 629(2)).
The judgment of 31 May 2023, file no. 31 Cdo 3125/2022, concerned an agent's fee payable 14 days after delivery of the invoice. The Grand Chamber held (paragraph 47) that where the creditor acquires a contractual right to payment of the agreed price, and the contract states only that the basis for payment is an invoice issued by the creditor with a 14-day due date, this is a case under Section 1958(2) in which the parties have not agreed when the debtor is to perform and the determination of that time is left to the creditor. Under paragraph 48, the circumstances decisive for the start of the limitation period are those from which the creditor learned, or should and could have learned, that the right to determine the time of performance had arisen. The court grounded this in the principle vigilantibus iura scripta sunt and in legal certainty (paragraph 51). On the facts, the subjective limitation period started on the day the invoice was issued, even though the debt fell due two weeks later, and an action brought three years after the due date was out of time.
The judgment of 3 September 2025, file no. IV. ÚS 778/25 (a window fitter whose work the client refused to take over), quashed a Supreme Court decision that had rejected the appeal by reference to the Grand Chamber. In paragraph 23 the Constitutional Court held that the parties had separately agreed a right of the creditor to trigger the due date, distinct from the right to performance; that only a claim which is due can be successfully pursued in court; and that where the parties agreed that the creditor sets the due date by calling for payment, for example by invoicing, the claim was not due until then, could not be pursued in court, and therefore the limitation period could not start running. In paragraph 24 it concluded that, out of respect for the autonomy of the will, the constitutionally sound conclusion is that the limitation period starts not when the legal relationship arises, but when the claim falls due, in that case on the due date of the claimant's invoice. The judgment rests on a breach of the right to judicial protection under Article 36(1) of the Charter.
Because of the rules on who unifies case law within the Supreme Court. By decision of 10 February 2026, file no. 23 Cdo 2613/2025, the three-judge chamber no. 23 referred the case to the Grand Chamber, stating that in the light of the Constitutional Court's judgment of 3 September 2025, file no. IV. ÚS 778/25, it had reached a view differing from Grand Chamber judgment 31 Cdo 3125/2022 and that the question should therefore be decided differently. By decision of 13 May 2026, file no. 31 Cdo 509/2026, the Grand Chamber sent the case back to chamber 23, relying on its earlier ruling R 73/2024: where a three-judge chamber is bound by the view expressed, for the case at hand, in a quashing judgment of the Constitutional Court, that is no ground for referring the case to the Grand Chamber, regardless of the fact that following the Constitutional Court will put the chamber's decision in conflict with a decision of the Grand Chamber. In that particular case, therefore, chamber 23 is bound by the Constitutional Court; in general, however, Grand Chamber judgment 31 Cdo 3125/2022 still stands and no unifying decision exists. Until the Grand Chamber revisits the issue in another case, a prudent creditor counts the period under the stricter reading.
The risk arises only where the parties have not agreed the time of performance and have left it to the creditor. If you agree the time of performance directly (for example, „the price of the work is payable within 30 days of handover“), the time of performance is agreed within the meaning of Section 1958(1) and the debtor must perform without being called upon. Between businesses, a statutory 30-day period also applies, running from delivery of the invoice or from delivery of the goods or provision of the service (Section 1963). For a work contract, the right to payment of the price arises upon completion of the work (Section 2610(1)), and where the work is taken over in parts, the right to payment for each part arises upon its completion.
Provisions cited from the current wording of Act No. 89/2012 Coll. (Sections 619, 629, 1958, 1963, 2610). Case law verified from full texts: Supreme Court judgment 31 Cdo 3125/2022 of 31 May 2023; Constitutional Court judgment IV. ÚS 778/25 of 3 September 2025; Supreme Court decision 23 Cdo 2613/2025 of 10 February 2026; Grand Chamber decision 31 Cdo 509/2026 of 13 May 2026.