Training Compensation (“TC”) – Waiving of Rights
I received a query over the weekend from the president of an African club and I thought to share:
1. What is a training compensation waiver?
2. Should I sign it?
You can check out my previous articles (Part 1, 2 and 3) for more on Training Compensation. However, for the purpose of this article, I’ll focus on Part 2 (link below) ⏬
As mentioned in my articles, TC has become a handicap for some clubs, players and agents because many clubs are unable (or unwilling) to pay these huge sums and therefore, unable to compete with the richer clubs for the best talent. This is where a waiver comes in. It simply means that a training club is giving up its right to receive its training rewards.
So for instance in the example in Part 2 above, TClub A was due to receive €100k and TClub B was due to receive €120k when the Gambian player, Modou signed his first professional contract. This meant that the Portuguese buying club would have to pay €220k, in addition to any agreed transfer fee. This may seem excessive for an untested player and the risk too much for some smaller buying clubs.
In this scenario, TClub A and TClub B could each sign a waiver which extinguishes their right to receive TC. However, any clubs that hope to rely on a waiver need to fully understand the requirements to ensure that the waiver is effective, otherwise, they could find themselves having to make the TC payments despite having received signed waivers 🤦🏽♀️.
Art. 9 par 7 of the FIFA Clearing House Regulations stipulate that where a training club has waived its right to receive training rewards, proof of a valid waiver needs to be uploaded in TMS by the new or buying club. It should also be clear, unambiguous and written in clear language which reflects the parties’ intention(s) to waive their right.
A recent CAS decision which was posted by Vasilis Fotiou a few weeks ago was in relation to a new club who had several waivers from training clubs but negligently failed to upload them on time. The training clubs therefore were awarded the various amounts and the new club appealed. However, CAS found in favour of the training clubs ⏬
As a club owner, if you sign a waiver, you lose the TC, but the player gets an opportunity to progress his career 🤷🏽♀️. If you don’t sign the waiver, you still don’t get the TC (😂) and the player loses an opportunity.
What I usually suggest as an alternative to NOT signing a waiver is a sell-on fee. In simple English, sign the waiver, and ask for a share of the player’s future economic value. Check out my previous article on fees.
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