web service empty relationship problem

hi all,

I have a pretty simple web service. Two entities, a citizen and a business. A citizen is able to register 0..n businesses. There is a WS which reads the citizen. When the business key list in citizen is empty the web service wont return the citizen (portal request failed could not execute web service operation). When at least one relation is defined all works fine.

I've tested the web service. The problem occurs only with VC.

thanks for your help,

regards, felix