Enforcing judgments and awards: the Law on Civil Judgment Enforcement 2025, the enforcement agencies after the 2025 restructuring, private enforcement offices, the five-year time limit, asset tracing, recognition of foreign court judgments, and secured creditors' priority

The new enforcement law

A judgment or award is worth what can be collected under it. In Vietnam collection is the business of the civil judgment enforcement system, and the law that governs it changed on 1 July 2026, when Law No. 106/2025/QH15 on Civil Judgment Enforcement, passed by the National Assembly on 5 December 2025, replaced Law No. 26/2008/QH12 as amended; a handful of provisions, including those on the digital database, took effect earlier, on 20 January 2026. The new law keeps the structure of the old one, a State enforcement system acting on the creditor's request, but adds three significant changes: private enforcement offices that creditors can engage under contract, a national civil judgment enforcement database connected to other national databases with electronic documents having the same legal value as paper (Article 5), and more specific duties on debtors and third parties to disclose assets.

Article 2 defines what is enforced: effective civil, commercial, labour and other civil judgments and decisions of Vietnamese courts, including foreign court judgments and foreign arbitral awards that a Vietnamese court has recognised and ordered to be enforced; first-instance judgments that are immediately enforceable despite appeal; decisions on interim measures; and awards and interim measures of Vietnamese arbitral tribunals under the Law on Commercial Arbitration. A foreign judgment or award that has not been recognised is not enforceable (Foreign arbitration and enforcement of awards).

Who enforces: the agencies after the 2025 restructuring

The State system was reorganised in 2025 in step with the courts and the provinces. At the centre, the former General Department of Civil Judgment Enforcement became the Department of Civil Judgment Enforcement Management (Cục Quản lý thi hành án dân sự) of the Ministry of Justice, under Decision No. 1898/QD-BTP of 25 June 2025. In each of the 34 provinces and centrally run cities there is a provincial civil judgment enforcement agency (Thi hành án dân sự tỉnh, thành phố), with legal personality, its own seal and accounts, and beneath it regional civil judgment enforcement divisions (Phòng Thi hành án dân sự khu vực), 355 in all, corresponding to the regional courts. Articles 17 and 19 of Law No. 106/2025/QH15 reflect that structure, and military-region enforcement bodies deal with judgments of the military courts.

Article 32 allocates cases between the levels; among other matters, recognised foreign judgments and awards and arbitral awards are enforced by the provincial agency, which works through its regional divisions where the assets are. Each case is handled by an enforcement officer (chấp hành viên), who issues the decisions, verifies assets, applies coercive measures and distributes the proceeds.

The new private enforcement offices (văn phòng thi hành án dân sự) are staffed by licensed enforcement practitioners (thừa hành viên), appointed by the chairman of the provincial People's Committee, who must hold at least a law degree and complete enforcement training (Article 29). An office is organised as a private enterprise or a partnership (Article 26). It acts on a creditor's request under a service contract, its head must issue the enforcement decision within five working days of signing (Article 31), and its practitioners may verify assets outside their own province (Article 30). The creditor pays the agreed fees. Where the office cannot complete the case or the contract ends, the file passes to the State agency. Implementing decrees on the offices were being issued during 2026, and the number of offices in operation should be checked before relying on this route.

Time limits, voluntary compliance and coercion

The creditor must request enforcement within five years of the date the judgment or award takes legal effect, or, for an obligation with a later due date, from that date (Article 34). Time lost to emergencies, objective obstacles or force majeure is excluded. The limit is strict, and a creditor that waits while trying to negotiate payment can lose the right to enforce. The request is filed with the competent agency, or a contract is signed with a private office, with the judgment or award, any recognition decision and information about the debtor's assets.

The agency issues an enforcement decision and notifies the debtor, who has ten days from valid notification to comply voluntarily (Article 36). The period does not apply to interim measures, which are enforced immediately. If the debtor does not pay, the officer may apply coercive measures: deducting money from bank accounts, freezing accounts and assets, garnishing income and receivables, seizing and auctioning assets including shares and real property, compelling a party to deliver property or perform an act, and requiring the debtor to vacate property. Coercion may not be carried out at night, on rest days or public holidays, and the debtor is notified at least two working days before a coercive operation unless immediate action is needed. Judgments for payment normally order interest on late payment from the date the creditor requests enforcement, at the rate provided by the Civil Code unless the parties agreed otherwise.

Finding the assets

Most enforcement cases fail not for want of legal powers but for want of identified assets. The enforcement officer may verify the debtor's assets and conditions for enforcement and require bodies holding information to provide it (Article 25); banks, tax authorities, land and vehicle registries, securities depositories and other bodies must act promptly on verification requests (Article 14); and the debtor must truthfully declare its accounts, assets and ability to pay (Article 7). The creditor has its own right to verify and to supply information (Article 6), and the commune-level People's Committee must provide information about local residents and assets (Article 10).

In practice the creditor's own work matters most. Before suing, and again before requesting enforcement, a creditor should assemble what it knows: the debtor's bank accounts from past payments, its customers and receivables, its land use rights from contracts or site visits, its vehicles and equipment, its shareholdings in other companies from the National Business Registration Portal, and any security registered against those assets in the secured transactions registry. Interim measures obtained during the case, such as account freezing, carry through to enforcement and are often the only reason a judgment is paid (Vietnamese courts and litigation). Where the debtor is insolvent, enforcement gives way to bankruptcy proceedings under Law No. 142/2025/QH15 on Recovery and Bankruptcy (Insolvency, restructuring and bankruptcy).

Enforcing a judgment or award against a Vietnamese debtor

1. Confirm the title is enforceableAn effective Vietnamese judgment, a Vietnamese award after the 30-day annulment window (or after an unsuccessful annulment application), a registered ad hoc award, or a foreign judgment or award recognised by a Vietnamese court.
2. Gather asset informationBank accounts, receivables, land use rights, vehicles, shareholdings and registered security; consider a pre-enforcement asset search.
3. Choose the State agency or a private officeFile with the provincial civil judgment enforcement agency, or sign a service contract with a licensed private enforcement office, within five years (Article 34).
4. Enforcement decision and voluntary periodThe decision is issued and notified; the debtor has ten days to pay voluntarily (Article 36).
5. Verification and coercionThe officer verifies assets with banks, registries and authorities and applies deductions, freezes, seizures and auctions as needed.
6. DistributionProceeds are paid out after enforcement costs, with secured creditors paid from their collateral in priority under the registered order.
7. If the debtor has no assetsThe agency records that the debtor lacks the conditions for enforcement and re-verifies periodically; the creditor may supply new information at any time or consider bankruptcy proceedings.

Recognising foreign court judgments

A foreign court judgment in a civil or commercial matter is enforceable in Vietnam only after recognition by a Vietnamese court, and recognition is available only in two cases under Article 423 of the Civil Procedure Code: where Vietnam and the judgment state are parties to a treaty providing for recognition, or, failing a treaty, on the basis of reciprocity (FAQ 75). Vietnam has bilateral judicial assistance agreements with about 17 countries, including China, France and Russia, but none with the United Kingdom, the United States or Singapore, and Vietnamese courts have not developed a settled practice of finding reciprocity for those states. Judgments from common-law jurisdictions are therefore unlikely to be recognised, which is the principal reason this guide recommends arbitration for cross-border contracts (Dispute resolution landscape and choice of forum).

The procedure mirrors that for foreign awards. The application is filed within three years of the judgment taking legal effect, through the Ministry of Justice where a treaty requires or directly with the court; since 1 July 2025 the regional court where the debtor is located hears it at first instance, with appeal to the provincial court. The court checks the judgment against the grounds for refusal in Article 439, which include that the judgment is not yet effective, that the defendant was not duly summoned or could not defend, that the case fell within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Vietnamese courts, that a Vietnamese court or another recognised judgment has already decided the same dispute, that the limitation period has expired, and that recognition would be contrary to the fundamental principles of Vietnamese law. The court fee is VND 3 million under Resolution No. 326/2016/UBTVQH14.

Security and priority

The surest protection against non-payment is security taken when the contract is made. Security interests are created under the Civil Code (Law No. 91/2015/QH13) and Decree No. 21/2021/ND-CP, and take effect against third parties on registration or possession; priority among secured creditors follows the order in which their security became effective against third parties, generally the order of registration (FAQ 80). Security over movable assets is registered online under Decree No. 99/2022/ND-CP with the Ministry of Justice's Department of Secured Transaction Registration and State Compensation; mortgages of land use rights and houses are registered with the land registration office. A new decree to replace Decree No. 99/2022/ND-CP is being drafted but had not been issued as at October 2026. Offshore lenders cannot take mortgages of land use rights under the Land Law 2024 and use an onshore security agent instead (Project finance, security and the financial centre).

In enforcement, the officer respects registered priority: proceeds from secured collateral pay the secured creditor first, after enforcement costs, and only the surplus is available to unsecured judgment creditors. A secured creditor may also enforce its security outside court, by the methods agreed in the security contract, such as sale or retention of the collateral, subject to notice and the debtor's handover; where the debtor resists, the creditor needs a court judgment or the enforcement agency's assistance. For guarantees and bank guarantees, the beneficiary's claim is against the guarantor, and an on-demand bank guarantee from a Vietnamese bank is in practice the most reliable form of payment security in Vietnam.