Competition Fines and the Investigation Process in Türkiye

If the Turkish Competition Authority is looking at your company, the case moves through a set sequence under Law No. 4054: a preliminary inquiry (önaraştırma), then, if concerns remain, a full investigation (soruşturma) with formal written defence rights, ending in a decision by the Competition Board. If the Board finds a breach, it can impose an administrative fine calculated as a proportion of your turnover generated in Türkiye, and separate fines on the managers or employees who played a determining role. You then have a route of appeal to the administrative courts and, ultimately, the Council of State (Danıştay). This guide walks a foreign company through each stage, what your rights are at every step, and where the real decision points lie.

The short answer: how a competition case unfolds

A competition matter in Türkiye is run by the Turkish Competition Authority (Rekabet Kurumu), whose decision-making body is the Competition Board (Rekabet Kurulu). The substantive rules and the procedure both sit in Law No. 4054 on the Protection of Competition (Rekabetin Korunması Hakkında Kanun, Law No. 4054), amended in 2020 by Law No. 7246.

The process is staged, and each stage has its own purpose:

1. Preliminary inquiry (önaraştırma) — a closed, fact-finding look at whether there is anything worth investigating. You may not even know it is happening.
2. Full investigation (soruşturma) — the formal phase. It opens with a Board decision, you are notified, and your written defence rights begin.
3. Defence and hearing — you respond in writing to the allegations and to the investigation report, and an oral hearing can be held.
4. Board decision — the Board decides whether there was a breach and, if so, what fine and remedies to impose.
5. Appeal — you can take the decision to the administrative courts and on to the Council of State (Danıştay).

Stage 1 — Preliminary inquiry (önaraştırma)

A case usually begins with a preliminary inquiry — in plain words, a first look to decide whether the matter is serious enough to investigate formally. It can be triggered by a complaint (often from a competitor, customer or distributor), by a leniency application from a cartel insider, by a referral, or by the Authority acting on its own initiative.

During this phase, case handlers gather information: they may send written requests for information, review market data, and in serious matters carry out an unannounced on-site inspection (a "dawn raid"). The preliminary inquiry is confidential, and a company under scrutiny may not be told it is the subject until the inquiry is complete or an inspection takes place.

At the end of the preliminary inquiry, the case handlers report to the Board, which makes a choice: close the file with no further action, or open a full investigation. Crucially, this is where many cases quietly end. A well-handled response to an information request — accurate, complete, on time — can be the difference between the file closing here and escalating to the next stage.

Stage 2 — The full investigation (soruşturma)

If the Board decides the matter warrants it, it issues a decision to open a full investigation. From this point the process becomes formal and your defence rights are triggered.

You are notified — and the clock starts

The Board must notify the undertakings under investigation that an investigation has been opened against them, identifying the conduct at issue. Once notified, you have a statutory period to submit your first written defence. The investigation phase as a whole is time-limited by statute, with a possible extension — so the case does not stay open indefinitely, but it does run on a calendar that you must track.

Fact-finding by the case team

During the investigation, the case handlers build the evidence: further information requests, witness or representative statements, on-site inspections, and economic analysis of the relevant market. You can be asked to provide documents and explanations more than once. The investigation closes with a main investigation report prepared by the case team, which sets out the findings and the conduct the Authority believes breached Law No. 4054.

Stage 3 — Your defence rights

Law No. 4054 builds defence rights into the procedure, and they are written, formal and time-bound. Used well, this is your real opportunity to change the outcome before the Board decides.

• First written defence — after you are notified that an investigation has opened, you have a set period to respond in writing to the allegations.
• Access and the investigation report — you are served with the case team's investigation report and are given a period to submit a written response to it. You can also request access to the file to understand the evidence against you.
• Reply and further exchange — there is a structured exchange of written submissions between the parties and the case team before the Board takes the matter up.
• Oral hearing — an oral hearing before the Board can be held on request or at the Board's initiative, giving you a chance to put your case in person.

These periods are real deadlines. Missing the window for a written defence, or treating it as a formality, forfeits the most effective stage at which to narrow the allegations, challenge the market definition, or contest how the case team characterised your conduct.

Stage 4 — The Board's decision and the fines

After the written phase and any hearing, the Competition Board decides. It can close the file with no breach, find a breach and impose fines and remedies, or accept commitments or a settlement that ends the case on agreed terms. A reasoned decision is issued and notified to the parties.

Fines on the company

If the Board finds a breach of the prohibitions in Law No. 4054, it can impose an administrative fine on the undertaking under Article 16. The fine is calculated as a proportion of the undertaking's annual turnover generated in Türkiye in the financial year before the decision, subject to a statutory ceiling. The percentage applied, how the base figure is built up, and the ceiling are fixed by statute and by the Authority's fining regulation and guidelines — and these have been revised. The size of the fine turns on factors such as the gravity and duration of the conduct, aggravating circumstances (for example, repeat conduct) and mitigating ones (for example, cooperation).

Fines on managers and employees

The exposure is not only corporate. Where managers or employees played a determining role in the breach, the Board can impose separate personal fines on those individuals, again as a proportion of the company-level fine and within statutory limits. This is a meaningful point for foreign companies: the people who attended a meeting with competitors or signed off on the conduct can be personally on the hook.

Remedies beyond the fine

The Board can also order behavioural or structural remedies to bring the breach to an end, and the prohibited agreement itself is legally invalid. Separately, parties harmed by the conduct may bring private damages claims in the civil courts — so a Board decision can be the trigger for follow-on litigation, not just the end of the public case.

Stage 5 — Appealing a Board decision

A Competition Board decision is an administrative act, and it can be challenged in court. You do not have to accept the fine as final.

The appeal route runs through the administrative judiciary: an annulment action is brought before the administrative courts (the specialised administrative courts in Ankara), within the statutory time limit that runs from notification of the reasoned decision. From there the matter can proceed on appeal up to the Council of State (Danıştay), Türkiye's highest administrative court. The court reviews the legality of the Board's decision — its reasoning, its evidence, its application of Law No. 4054 and its calculation of the fine.

Two practical points matter. First, the deadline to file is short and strict; miss it and the decision becomes final. Second, bringing an action does not automatically suspend the fine — you generally need to request a stay of execution (yürütmenin durdurulması) if you want to hold off enforcement while the case is heard.

What a foreign company should do at each stage

The recurring lesson for foreign businesses is that the early stages decide the case. By the time a fine lands, most of the leverage is gone. A sensible playbook:

1. On any contact from the Authority — a request for information or, especially, an inspection — engage Turkish competition counsel before responding. Preserve documents and do not delete anything.
2. If an investigation is opened — diarise every statutory deadline immediately, request access to the file, and build the substantive defence (market, evidence, attribution) from day one.
3. Respond to the investigation report in full — this is your last clear chance to shape the Board's view before it decides.
4. Consider the structured options — commitments, settlement or, in cartel cases, leniency can change the trajectory, but each is a high-stakes decision to take with counsel, not unilaterally.
5. Protect the appeal — if the decision goes against you, watch the short filing deadline and consider a stay of execution.

How Lexin Legal helps

Lexin Legal represents foreign companies through the full arc of a Turkish competition matter — responding to information requests and inspections, drafting written defences and responses to the investigation report, appearing before the Competition Board, advising on settlement and leniency, and bringing annulment actions before the administrative courts and the Council of State. If you have received a notice, a request for information, or an inspection has taken place, the priority is to engage counsel before the next document goes in. See our Competition & Antitrust practice or contact our Istanbul office.

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