Chargeback Attachment Rejected: İzmir Appeal Court Ruling 2026/1256

A cardholder disputes a purchase, the bank that issued the card takes the money back, and at the end of the chain the bank providing the POS service asks the merchant for the amount. Simple on paper, this "chargeback" chain raises a question once it reaches court: are the bank's records enough to place a precautionary attachment on the merchant's assets before the case is even decided?

By its decision of 13.07.2026, Docket No. E.2026/831, Decision No. K.2026/1256, the 11th Civil Chamber of the İzmir Regional Court of Appeal lifted and rejected a precautionary attachment order granted for a claim of TRY 1,345,020.35 said to arise from chargeback transactions. According to the Chamber, whether the merchant breached the contract, whether the bank actually suffered a loss and how fault is to be divided all require a full trial, so the prima facie proof requirement was not met at this stage.

💳 The POS, the Purchase Dispute and the Bank's Claim

The parties to the dispute are a bank providing POS services and a limited company that obtained a POS device from that bank under a merchant agreement. According to the account in the appeal petition, the company provides tourism and travel services. Cardholders disputed their purchases at this merchant with their own banks; the disputes were passed on to the POS bank through chargebacks.

According to the bank's account, the process went as follows:

1. Payment: As a result of the cardholders' disputes and the refund transactions, the bank was obliged to pay TRY 1,154,174.00 on 29.06.2025.
2. Notice: A notice declaring the debt due, together with an account statement, was sent to the company on 07.10.2025.
3. Enforcement: As no payment was made, enforcement proceedings without a court judgment were started at the İzmir Bank Receivables Enforcement Office; the proceedings were stayed by the debtor's objection.
4. Mediation and lawsuit: No agreement was reached in mediation, and the bank filed an action to annul the objection, claiming enforcement denial compensation of not less than 20%.
5. Precautionary attachment request: In a petition dated 14.04.2026, the bank requested, first without security and, failing that, against security, a precautionary attachment of the company's movable and immovable property and of its rights and receivables held by third parties, for TRY 1,345,020.35.

🏛️ The Two Interim Decisions of the Court of First Instance

The İzmir 6th Commercial Court of First Instance (E.2026/75) assessed the request in two stages.

Interim decision of 16.04.2026: Under Article 257 of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law (İİK), the court granted the precautionary attachment request against 15% security and ordered the attachment of the company's property and of its rights and receivables held by third parties, up to the amount of TRY 1,345,020.35 and with due regard to legal limits.

Interim decision of 13.05.2026: A hearing was held on the company's objection. The court recalled that the creditor of a money debt that is due and not secured by a pledge may request a precautionary attachment, and that this requires prima facie proof of the existence of the claim. It then stated that the grounds of objection under Article 265 of the İİK are limited to the grounds on which the attachment is based, the court's jurisdiction and the security; that the points raised by the objecting party were not among these grounds; that the amount of security was reasonable; and that the subject of the objection required a trial. It therefore rejected the objection.

📑 The Merchant's Grounds of Appeal

The lawyer of the company against which the attachment was granted appealed this interim decision. The main objections in the petition are as follows:

⚖️ The Regional Court of Appeal's Assessment

The Chamber limited its review to the grounds of appeal and public policy, as provided by Article 355 of the Code of Civil Procedure (HMK). The backbone of its reasoning is the second sentence of Article 258/1 of the İİK: the creditor must present evidence that persuades the court as to the claim and, where necessary, the ground for attachment. According to the Chamber, this provision does not require full and conclusive proof of the claim; evidence that creates conviction is sufficient. Who is right under substantive law will be examined in an action for a negative declaration, an action to annul the objection or a restitution claim brought under Article 264 of the İİK.

The Chamber then added an important procedural note: if the evidence was not fully gathered on the date of the request, then after the evidence has been collected and examined during the trial, the court may make a new assessment within the framework of prima facie proof if the request is renewed.

Turning to the case at hand, the Chamber found that the court of first instance had granted the request solely on the ground that the debt was due and not secured by a pledge, and stressed that the following points were unclear:

1. whether the defendant merchant breached its obligations under the merchant agreement,
2. whether the bank actually suffered a loss,
3. if a loss arose, in what proportion the parties were at fault.

It stated that these points require a trial, that there was not enough evidence to establish prima facie proof of the existence and amount of the claim, and that the defendant had made no allegation and presented no evidence of asset concealment. The request for a precautionary attachment should therefore have been rejected, and granting it was not correct.

Finding no need for a retrial, the Chamber upheld the appeal under Article 353/1-b-2 of the HMK, set aside the interim decision rejecting the objection, accepted the objection, lifted the precautionary attachment order of 16.04.2026 and rejected the bank's request for a precautionary attachment. Under Article 362/1-f of the HMK, the decision was given as final and unanimously.

🔍 The Prima Facie Proof Standard and Chargebacks

The main contribution of the decision is that, for claims arising from chargebacks, the statement "payment was made and the debt has fallen due" is not by itself treated as enough for a precautionary attachment. The fact that the bank paid the cardholders does not in itself show that this payment can be recovered from the merchant. The existence of a right of recourse depends on whether the merchant acted in breach of the contract and whether the disputes were justified.

The assessment criteria that emerge from the decision can be summarised as follows:

The issue of disputes over card payments has also been covered on our site from other angles: the position of a cardholder whose chargeback request was rejected, against the bankTR and the relationship between a MASAK block and a chargeback are among these articles. This decision, by contrast, focuses on the other end of the chain, that is, the interim protection the bank turns to when seeking recourse against the merchant.

📘 Provisions Applied in the Decision

The Chamber and the court of first instance relied on the following provisions (the texts are summarised as currently in force on mevzuat.gov.tr):

The court of first instance had treated the points raised in the objection as falling outside the limited grounds in Article 265 of the İİK. The Chamber, however, reached its result by assessing the objection from the angle of the ground on which the precautionary attachment rests, namely the absence of prima facie proof of the claim.

❓ Questions and Answers

For detailed information and legal support, you can contact Savun Law & Consultancy. Contact details are on the contact page, and other decisions are in the Precedent DecisionsTR archive.