WhatsApp messages are enough to prove you have credit
Judge grants injunction to a private teacher: the student's mother had asked by phone for an extension, which was not honoured
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Key points
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The injunction issued by the Justice of the Peace of Avellino reinforces a new jurisprudential direction increasingly oriented towards computerised means of proof (Justice of the Peace of Latina 2399/2021, Court of Milan 6935/2021, Court of Ravenna 231/2017), for which the printing out of WhatsApp messages attesting to the existence of a claim is suitable evidence for the acceptance of an appeal for an injunction.
The creditor had given private lessons in mathematics. The boy's mother, after agreeing and paying part of the amount in instalments, remained indebted for a remaining sum. Reminders via WhatsApp messages to pay the difference, also in instalments, were to no avail. From the tenor of the numerous reassuring messages sent by the debtor in response to the teacher's solicitations, the residual payment obligation clearly emerged, so much so that the writings constitute a realpromise to pay and acknowledgement of debt (Article 1988, Civil Code), which is why the creditor is exempt from proving the fundamental relationship.
Mathematics Lessons
.The creditor appealed to the judge by producing a printout of the messaging traffic exchanged on WhatsApp with the debtor. The judge in Irpinia, considering the claim proved on the basis of the exchange of digital correspondence, granted the injunction in favour of the teacher. Since WhatsApp messages constitute unilateral promises by private writing, the plaintiff had emphasised the suitability of such computerised means as equivalent to traditional private writing.
The messages exchanged between the creditor and the debtor clearly showed the existence of an economic relationship and the related obligation to pay. Therefore, the decision of the Irpinian court granted injunctive relief to the plaintiff on the basis of the transcripts of the messages, which, although constituting suitable written evidence of the claim, could not, however, form the basis of the application for provisional enforceability.
"Documentary evidence"
.The WhatsApp message falls within the group of documentary evidence known to the legal system through its qualification in terms of computer reproduction. Such a message, constituting documentary evidence, has been held to be suitable written evidence for the purposes of granting an injunction where it contains the debtor's acknowledgement of the debt in favour of the creditor. Article 2712, Civil Code provides that computer reproductions and, in general, any other mechanical representation of facts and things shall form full evidence. And it is precisely the wording "any other mechanical representation of facts and things" that leads to an extensive interpretation of the rule to the extent of including any new form of representation of facts including, precisely, WhatsApp messages.
