Power of attorney in Uzbekistan: 3 years max, void without a date

Your company's driver collects goods from a supplier's warehouse. The warehouse refuses to hand them over: the power of attorney he shows has no date on it. That is not the warehouse being difficult. Under the Civil Code, that paper is void.

Short answer: a power of attorney (ishonchnoma) must carry the date it was issued, or it is void. It can be given for 3 years at most. If it names no term, it lasts 1 year from the day it was issued. The person who gave it can revoke it at any time.

What a power of attorney is

The Civil Code (arts. 134–144) calls it a written authority that one person gives another to represent them before third parties. The representative acts only within the powers written in it. So the powers are the heart of the document: say exactly what the person may do, and for whom.

A company may give or receive a power of attorney only for deals that do not contradict the aims set in its charter.

The three numbers

The date is not a formality: the Code says a power of attorney without the date of issue is void, and the term is counted from that date.

Who signs, and when you need a notary

A power of attorney is made in simple written form or certified by a notary.

• From your company: signed by the head of the company, with the company seal if it has one. No notary needed. In a state-owned company, a power of attorney to receive or hand over money or other valuables must also be signed by the chief accountant.
• Notary required: for deals that themselves need a notary, and for acting toward legal entities. Exceptions are the company's own power of attorney above, the cases in the next point, powers of attorney certified by the head of a military hospital, military unit or detention facility (the Code treats these as notarized), and other cases where legislation sets a different form.
• Simpler certification: a power of attorney to collect wages and other work payments, fees of authors and inventors, pensions, benefits, stipends, mail, parcels or sums from a bank may be certified by the employer or place of study, the housing organization, the local self-government body (mahalla) or the hospital where the person is treated.
• Bank operations: the Code leaves the procedure and form of a power of attorney for bank operations to other legislation. Ask your bank which form it accepts under those rules.

Passing the authority on

The representative must act in person. They may pass the authority to someone else (delegation) only if the power of attorney allows it, or if circumstances force them to, to protect your interests.

• The delegated power of attorney must be notarized, except in the cases where the Code accepts other certification (the company's own power of attorney, the simpler certifications above, and powers of attorney the Code treats as notarized, such as those certified in military units, military hospitals or detention facilities).
• It cannot last longer than the original one.
• The representative who delegates must tell you, and give you the new person's details and address. If they do not, they answer for the new person's acts as if they were their own.

What ends it

A power of attorney ends when:

1. its term runs out;
2. the person who gave it revokes it;
3. the representative renounces it;
4. the legal entity that issued it ceases its activity;
5. the legal entity it was issued to ceases its activity;
6. the person who gave it dies, or is declared legally incapable, of limited capacity or missing;
7. the same happens to the person who received it.

You can revoke at any time, and the representative can renounce at any time. A clause in which either side gives up that right is void. When the power of attorney ends, any delegation made under it ends too.

Revoking is not enough on its own. You must tell the representative and the third parties you know the document was meant for. Until the representative knew, or should have known, of the revocation, what they did still binds you toward third parties, unless the third party knew or should have known that it had ended. After that, their acts create no rights or duties for you. Once it has ended, the representative (or their heirs) must give the document back at once.

What to do now

• Date every power of attorney and write the term in it. If you need longer than 3 years, plan to reissue it.
• List the powers precisely: which contracts, which amounts, which counterparties.
• Say whether delegation is allowed. If you do not want it, do not grant it.
• Keep a register of the powers of attorney your company has issued, with their end dates.
• When someone leaves or you revoke, send written notice to the representative and to every counterparty that has seen the document, and ask for the original back.

Powers of attorney usually sit beside contracts: see our guide to civil-law contracts and the ready-made agreements in the Store. Unsure whether yours will hold up? Ask us.

Sources

• Civil Code of Uzbekistan, part one, arts. 134–144 (chapter 10) — lex.uz

Checked against the law in Lex on 6 October 2026 · Juris Advisory

Photo: Xayriddin Baxromxo’jayev, Pexels