Brussels, 27/04/2012 (Agence Europe) - In a ruling returned on Thursday 25 April in Case C-472/10, the Court of Justice of the EU ruled that Hungarian legislation stating that the invalidity of an unfair clause in a contract, once this has been ruled upon by a jurisdiction further to an action in the public interest (group action brought, in the case in question, by a national consumer protection authority) complies with Directive 93/13/EEC, which applies to any consumer who has taken out a contract with a professional, in which this clause features. The Court takes the view that legislation of this kind constitutes an “adequate and effective” resource to implement the object of the directive, which is to prevent the use of unfair clauses.
The Court was asked to determine whether this legislation complies with European law by Pest County Court (Hungary), to which the national consumer protection authority brought an action to cancel an unfair clause introduced unilaterally into subscription contracts by the fixed telephony operator Invitel, which conferred on the latter the right to charge its clients “contract costs” covering the costs applied when invoices were paid by postal order, also failing to give any details on the way these charges have been calculated.
In its ruling, the Court points out that although it does not aim to harmonise sanctions in this matter, the directive obliges the member states to allow “persons or organisations, having a legitimate interest under national law in protecting consumers, to take action according to the national law concerned before the courts before competent administrative bodies for a decision as to whether contractual terms drawn up for general use are unfair, so that they can apply appropriate and effective means to prevent the continued use of such terms”. It also points out that in order to ensure that public interest actions have a proper deterrent effect, clauses declared unfair in the framework of an action of this kind carried out against the professional in question should not link consumers who are directly parties to the procedure, or those who have concluded a contract with this professional to which the same general conditions apply. Again to this effect, public interest actions of this kind may be brought even before unfair clauses have been used in contracts.
This means that the Hungarian legislation referred to is perfectly in keeping with the directive, which obliges the member states to ensure that adequate and effective means exist to prevent the use of unfair clauses. It is therefore in line with the directive. In this respect, the Court concludes that in the future, if the invalidity of an unfair clause is confirmed, the national courts must therefore draw all the consequences from this to prevent the unfair clause from being binding upon consumers who have taken out a contract containing it and to which the same general conditions apply. Invitel is to be interpreted on these bases. (FG/transl.fl)