Cancellation of a document

A district court may on petition cancel a document that has been lost or destroyed. Most commonly, these are share certificates.

The owner of the document or the person who should have possession of the document can request cancellation of the document. In addition to a petition, the person must provide the court a copy of the document or reliable information on its contents as well as a statement on the legal basis of the petitioner’s ownership of the document. Additional information or appendices may be needed depending on the type of the document requested to be cancelled.

If the document pertains to a real estate unit or an apartment, the case will be processed by the district court of the municipality in which the real estate unit or apartment is located. If the document does not pertain to any municipality, the petition should be filed with the district court of the petitioner’s place of residence.

The district court will issue a public notice on the case that is published in the Official Journal of Finland (virallinenlehti.fi, only in Finnish and Swedish). At the earliest, the case will be decided without a hearing after three months from the date on which the public notice is published.