FIFA’s April 2018 amendments to its Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (RSTP)

On 6 November 2017, FIFA (the world governing body for football) and FIFPro (the World Players’ Union) reached a wide ranging 6 year cooperation agreement1 to strengthen relationships between the two organisations and improve the governance of professional football worldwide.

Additionally, an agreement was reached between FIFA, FIFPro, the European Club Association (ECA) and the World Leagues Forum under the umbrella of FIFA’s newly formed "Football Stakeholders Committee", which includes confederations, member associations and professional football stakeholders.

Among the improvements agreed were several changes regarding dispute resolution between players and clubs, particularly for decisions in cases of overdue payables, as well as new provisions to avoid the abusive conduct of parties, such as players being forced to train alone. As a consequence of these commitments and the implementation of the agreement, FIFPro withdrew the complaint against FIFA lodged with the European Commission2 in September 2015.

Some changes had already been enacted in November 2017, with the FIFA transfer system (the FIFA TMS3) applying both to male and female athletes, the latter not having been part of the TMS system since its creation.

Nonetheless, on 26 April 2018, FIFA released Circular Letter 16254 introducing the other changes to the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (RSTP) in line with FIFA’s agreement with FIFPro, which are valid as of 1 June 2018.

This article analyses the changes, namely:

• New Article 24bis - execution of monetary decisions

• Articles 14bis and amended Article 18 - overdue payables provisions

• Article 14 - abusive conduct

• Article 17 - new parameters for player compensation