Consumer Protection in EU - Law
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU – Directives I
• EU – politics: to install an area without internal
frontiers in which the free movement of goods,
persons, services and capital is guaranteed.
• Art. 153 of the Treaty establishing the EUCommunity: basis of uniform minimum set of
fair rules governing the contracts concluded by
consumers in the area of the Member States.
• These rules are laid down in EU-Directives.
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directives II
• Obligation of the Member States to implement
the content of the Directives into national law
within a certain period
• Minimum content of the directives
• In consumer protection - politics: e.g.
directive 85/374 product – liability for
defective products; 85/577 doorstep-selling
contracts; 1999/44 sales of consumer goods
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directive on liability on
defective products I
• Purpose of this Directive is to create a liability
without fault on the part of the producer as the
sole means of adequately solving the problem,
peculiar to our age of increasing technicality.
• Art. 1 of this Directive requires that the producer
is liable for damage caused by a defect in his
product.
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directive on liability on
defective products II
• This protection requires that all producers involved in the
production process should be made liable (who has
supplied the finished product, component part or any raw
material).
• The circle of „producer“ has been enlarged to any person
who presents himself as a producer by putting his name or
trade mark on the defective product, to any person who has
imported the defective product into the Community in the
course of his business and to any person who has supplied
the product if the producer cannot be identified.
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directive on liability on
defective products III
• „product“ means all movables and includes
electricty.
• The injured person has to prove the damage,
the defect and the causal relationship between
defect and damage.
• A product is defective when it does not provide
the safety which a person is entitled to expect
(excluding any misuse of the product not
reasonable under the circumstances).
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directive on liability on
defective products IV
• A product is not defective for the only reason that
a better product has been introduced in the market.
• The producer is not liable if he proves that
– he didn‘t put the product in the circulation,
– the defect didn‘t exist at that time,
– the state of scientific and technical knowledge at this
time was not such to enable to discover the existence of
the defect.
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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EU-Directive on liability on
defective products V
• „Damage“ means
– Damage caused by death or personal injuries,
– Damage to, or destruction of, any item of property
other than the defective product itself, with a lower
threshold of 500 €, provided that the item of property
• is of a type ordinarly intended for private use or
consumption, and
• was used by the injured person mainly for his own private
use or consumption.
Consumer Protection in EU - Law,
Prof. Dr. Michael Frings
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