Rome, December 1, 2025 — The Italian authority has closed its investigation into the National Bar Council’s (Consiglio Nazionale Forense, CNF) disciplinary rule on equitable fees after accepting commitments that confine the measure to work for large, powerful clients and exclude ordinary clients from its scope.
The case concerned article 25-bis of the legal profession’s deontological code, introduced in 2024 to implement Italy’s 2023 “equo compenso” law. That statute requires fees to be “equitable” and aligned with ministerial parameters when lawyers and other professionals work for so-called “big clients” such as banks, insurers, medium and large companies, and public bodies.
Authority’s Concerns
The authority opened proceedings in March 2025 under Article 101 TFEU and Italian law 287/1990, arguing that the way CNF drafted and explained Article 25-bis risked turning a targeted protection for work done for big clients into a de facto fee floor across the whole market.
In particular:
- The first paragraph of Article 25-bis required lawyers not to agree or quote fees that were not “just, equitable and proportionate” and not set according to the official parameters, without clearly limiting this obligation to relations with big clients.
- CNF communications and opinions to local bar councils, including a 2024 opinion to the Turin bar, treated deviations from the parameter system as a breach of the equo compenso rules without clearly restricting this to large client mandates.
- The annotated code also attached aggravated disciplinary sanctions (up to a one-year suspension) for serious breaches of the new rule.
According to the authority, this reading could compress price competition for legal services to ordinary clients by inducing lawyers to avoid fees below the parameter levels even where the equo compenso statute did not apply.
CNF Commitments
To address those concerns, CNF offered a package of commitments, which the authority has now made binding:
- Article 25-bis will be rewritten to explicitly state that the obligation to agree equitable fees in line with parameters applies only to services provided to “big clients” (banks, insurers and their groups, medium and large firms over specified size thresholds, and public administrations and their controlled entities).
- CNF will send a circular to all local bar councils, to be forwarded to all registered lawyers, explaining that the disciplinary rule applies solely to big-client relationships. The Council will also publicise the change widely via press releases to specialist and general media, its website, social channels, newsletters, and its house journal Il Dubbio.
- From 2026 to 2028, CNF will organise annual training or conferences on the new rule, designed to reach both existing members and new registrants.
- CNF must complete the internal approval process for the revised Article 25-bis within six months of the commitments decision, including consultation with local bar councils and publication in the Official Gazette.
In light of these changes, the authority concluded that the commitments eliminate the risk that the deontological rule will operate as a general fee floor in the market for legal services to ordinary clients. It therefore closed the case without finding an infringement, while making the commitments legally binding and reserving the right to act if they are not properly implemented.
Source: https://www.agcm.it/dotcmsdoc/bollettini/2025/46-25.pdf
