Not every contract for intermediation services is an agency agreement. An agent’s intermediation must be continuing in nature.
What does this mean?
The Civil Code provides no definition. Case law and legal commentary nevertheless identify typical features.
🔎 Intermediation can usually be considered continuing where it is:
🔵 continuous: the agent regularly performs intermediation activities and the relationship is ongoing rather than one-off;
🔵 recurring: it concerns contracts which the principal concludes periodically or in series;
🔵 unlimited: it concerns an unlimited number of contracts, although some take the view that limiting the number of contracts does not itself prevent intermediation from being continuing.
❗ When is intermediation NOT continuing?
As a general rule, this requirement will not be met if the intermediary’s task is to conclude a single, specific contract.
❗ But take care…
If that contract is to be renewed, extended or regularly renegotiated, the intermediary’s activities may be continuing even if they “formally” concern just one contract.
Whether intermediation is continuing must be assessed in light of the entire relationship between agent and principal.
