Garnishment of Third-Party Debtors by the Italian Tax Authority: The Attachment Automatically Lapses After 60 Days

When a taxpayer owes a debt to the Italian tax authorities — for instance, an unpaid tax collection notice ("cartella di pagamento") — the Italian Revenue Collection Agency (Agenzia delle Entrate Riscossione) may choose not to act directly against the debtor, but instead against a third party who owes that debtor money: a bank holding a current account, an employer, a client, or a tenant liable for rent payments. The instrument used in these cases is garnishment of third-party debtors (pignoramento presso terzi), in the simplified form provided for under Article 72-bis of Presidential Decree 602/1973.

A recent order issued by the Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione, Fifth Civil Section, No. 30214 of 16 November 2025) offers an opportunity to clarify a point of considerable practical relevance concerning the consequences of a failure to comply with the statutory deadlines.

How the Procedure Works

Article 72-bis of Presidential Decree 602/1973 grants the Collection Agent the power to serve a direct payment order on the third-party debtor, without the need to first apply to the competent court. The procedure is designed to ensure particularly swift recovery: once served with notice, the garnished third party has 60 days to pay the Agency the sums owed to the debtor subject to enforcement.

The issue addressed by case law concerns the consequences of that deadline expiring without payment having been made.

The Settled Principle: Automatic Lapse of the Attachment

The now-prevailing line of authority in the Court of Cassation holds that, once the 60-day period from service has expired without payment, the garnishment automatically loses its executory effect, without any need for an objection by the debtor or any court order declaring its termination.

Two significant consequences follow from this principle:

1. Payment made by the third party after the deadline is not enforceable against the debtor. It follows that such payment does not extinguish the third party's obligation toward the debtor (consider an employer who would still owe the employee's salary, or a tenant who would still owe rent), and that any sums collected late by the Agency must be returned to the taxpayer.

2. Should the Collection Agent nevertheless wish to recover the debt, once the deadline has lapsed it cannot extend the effects of the simplified procedure, but must instead initiate ordinary enforcement proceedings under Articles 543 et seq. of the Code of Civil Procedure, summoning both the third party and the debtor before the enforcement judge.

   
   

The Case Decided by the Court of Cassation: Delay by a Public Administration

Order No. 30214/2025 is of particular interest because the defaulting "garnished third party" in this instance was not a private party, but the Revenue Agency itself, which owed a company a sum for reimbursement of litigation costs following a tax judgment.

The Agency had paid the Collection Agent, but after the statutory 60-day deadline. The taxpayer company argued — with the backing of the tax courts of first and second instance, which had appointed a court-designated official (commissario ad acta) to enforce compliance — that the late payment was unenforceable against it and that its debt could not therefore be considered extinguished.

The Revenue Agency appealed to the Court of Cassation, raising two distinct defenses, both of which were rejected by the Court.

On the alleged applicability of the Covid-19 suspension of deadlines. The Administration argued that the delay was justified by the suspension of payment deadlines provided for under Article 68 of Decree-Law 18/2020 (the "Cura Italia" decree). The Court rejected this argument, clarifying that the suspension in question concerns payments owed by taxpayers to the tax authorities, not payments owed by the garnished third party — a party that, within this procedure, acts as an auxiliary of the enforcement judge rather than as a tax debtor. Extending the suspension to this scenario would have defeated the purpose of the provision, which was introduced to ease the economic hardship of taxpayers during the pandemic emergency, not to protect the Administration acting in the capacity of garnished third party.

On the alleged need for a formal objection. The Administration further argued that, absent an objection by the debtor, the attachment remained in force even after the deadline had expired. This argument, too, was rejected: the Court reaffirmed that the loss of effect occurs automatically upon the mere expiry of the deadline, given that this is a procedure conducted entirely outside judicial oversight, with no enforcement case file and no judge assigned to the matter. Holding otherwise would leave the garnished debt subject to an indefinite attachment, a result incompatible with the logic of speed underlying the entire mechanism.

Concluding Remarks

The principle affirmed by the Court of Cassation carries a twofold practical significance. For the party acting as garnished third party — a credit institution, employer, tenant, or client — the automatic lapse of the attachment after 60 days prevents the position from remaining indefinitely pending in the absence of any formal step. For the debtor subject to enforcement, by contrast, the guarantee remains that payment made by the third party after the deadline has no discharging effect, and that sums paid late must be returned.

It should finally be noted that the regulatory framework is moving toward stronger preventive controls in this area: as of 15 June 2026, thanks to the availability of electronic invoicing data held by the Revenue Agency, the preventive verification obligation set out in Article 48-bis of Presidential Decree 602/1973 will also apply to professional fees, broadening the scope of the checks that public administrations must carry out before making payments to parties with outstanding tax debts.