The operation was for a professional activity, but the court granted the guarantors, the apothecary’s parents, the status of consumers.

The Provincial Court of Pontevedra has declared the nullity of a floor clause that was included in a mortgage loan for 2.1 million euros for the purchase of a chemist’s shop. Although the borrower, the chemist, does not have the status of consumer since the loan was taken out for the exercise of her professional activity, the court granted this status to her parents, who acted as joint guarantors for the transaction. The judges concluded that there was no evidence that the couple had “any economic interest” in the or that chemist’s they “directly or indirectly received benefits” from it.

As Fernando Salmerón, director of Bufete Salmerón Law Firm located in Seville and with thousands of judgments won in claims against the Bank, states, the Chemist has the status of a professional, so the regulations on consumption cannot be applied, but in the case that there are guarantors outside the business of the Chemist’s. The parents are the guarantors of the son or daughter, and by considering the condition of the guarantors as consumers in this transaction, the court opens the door for the court to analyse whether the clause complies with the so-called “double control of transparency”, and therefore concludes by declaring the clause null and void.