Article 4 of Law Decree no. 23 of April 8, 2020 (the so-called "Liquidity Decree") introduces an important though temporary, innovation in terms of simplifying the procedures, for retail customers, for executing contracts concerning banking and payment services, loan agreements and consumer credit agreements. According to the Decree, during the Covid19 emergency period (i.e., until July 31, 2020) such contracts shall comply with the requirements regarding written form and shall have the evidentiary value referred to in Article 2702 of the Italian Civil Code if executed - not only by means of an advanced, qualified or digital electronic signature as provided for by Article 20, par. 1-bis of the Digital Administration Code, but also - by means of the so-called simple electronic signature. In other words, the customer may expresses his/her consent by sending an ordinary email or through "other appropriate means", provided that the exchange of consents is accompanied by a copy of an I.D. of the customer and refers to a specific identifiable contract and the whole process is stored in such a way as to guarantee its security, integrity and it cannot be altered.

The above-mentioned legislative innovation reaffirms the so-called "principle of non-discrimination of electronic signatures" provided for by Article 25 of the eIDAS (EU) Regulation according to which "an electronic signature cannot be denied legal effects and admissibility as evidence in legal proceedings for the sole reason of its electronic form or because it does not meet the requirements of qualified electronic signatures" and it cannot be excluded that, in this emergency period, this could represent an opening to simplify the electronic execution of contracts in all sectors for which the requirement of the written form is requested for their validity or for evidentiary purposes.

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