If no financial success is achieved, you will not have to bear any costs or risks. In case of success Sophokles receives a certain portion of the money as previously agreed upon in a written litigation funding agreement.

You will bear no risk and will not have to pay any costs. The whole process is coordinated by us. This includes the careful selection of specialized lawyers, the preparation of expert opinions by competent experts and a convenient bundling of claims.

By contacting us. We will then check back with you and provide you with an offer.

If you bought or leased a truck with a payload capacity over 6 tonnes between 1997 and 2011 from Daimler, Iveco, DAF, MAN, Volvo / Renault or Scania.

This does not affect your claims for damages, they still exist. Only in the amount of the compensation you may have to accept a discount, because you are assumed to have achieved a higher resale price by the excessive prices for trucks during the period in question than without the cartel’s manipulations.

You only have to prove that you have bought or leased the respective truck from one of the affected manufacturers during the period in question. If no documents are available at all, then the purchase price is estimated by a plausibility check.

At the present time, this is difficult to estimate. In case of litigation, it may take several years. If a settlement can be reached, either at some early stage of litigation or out of court, it would take much less time.

We will first try to achieve an acceptable out-of-court settlement. Past experience rather suggests that there will be litigation. A common strategy of large corporations in similar cases is often to make life as difficult as possible for claimants to achieve a deterrent effect.

We will presumably file the lawsuits in Germany. Since every member of the cartel can be sued in cartel proceedings, we can choose which member we sue. This means, for example, in case you have purchased a truck from Iveco, you can claim damages from Daimler. This is a special feature of the antitrust law. The only exception in this complex will probably be MAN. Since they were very cooperative in the official investigation into the cartel, MAN cannot be held liable for the inflated prices of the other cartel members. However, buyers of MAN trucks may very well demand damages from the other cartel members.

This is currently completely unclear. Probably the first claims get time-barred at the end of 2017. In view of the work that needs to be done to prepare the case this is not much time. Therefore, a rapid assertion of the claims is highly recommended.

This is not yet clear. It is expected that extensive assessments will be necessary to quantify the damage suffered by buyers as a result of the illegal cartel. We assume it will be in the region of 10-20% of the purchase price or leasing rates.

Once you have selected the required documents, almost no more effort is required from you. We strive to take as much work out of your hands as possible. You will not have to personally participate in any proceedings.

Of course, you remain free to do so. Try it. The result will probably not satisfy you. The past has often shown that corporations vigorously deny compensation claims out of hand, no matter how valid they may be. Companies are taking advantage of the deterrent effect of a complex lawsuit. They expect the strict refusal to pay anything will work in their favour if only a fraction of the claimants eventually go to court. And regrettably, they are probably right. To help in such cases by means of litigation funding we have founded Sophokles.