Services Standards: Defining the Core Consumer Elements ... - ANEC

Services Standards
extent the Service Directive fits into the already existing EC approach on
services. It could be demonstrated that the Service Directive constitutes the
break even point in the EC regulation of services. It opens up new perspectives
in combining traditional and less traditional regulatory measures, more
particularly in giving technical standardisation and consumer involvement a
small, but nevertheless important stand.
The overall purpose of the Directive is to enable cross border services and to
enhance freedom of establishment. In this respect it largely codifies the already
established case law of the European Court of Justice 216 . The Directive does not
really deal with consumer policy matters. All in all, seven different settings which
affect consumers and standardisation can be distinguished in the Directive:
a) Home country control and host country control
Article 35 of the Directive establishes the home country control principle 217 very
much along the line of the banking and insurance directives. The host country 218
may take action in exceptional circumstances, in particular with regard to the
safety of services, as long as these have not yet been subject to Community
harmonisation (Article 18 (2) (a) of the Service Directive, in following the
procedure for mutual assistance laid down in Article 35 (1) and (2) of the
Service Directive). This means, in essence, that the host country is in principle
legally obliged to rely on the control and supervision exercised in the home
country of the company concerned. However, the host country retains residual
competence outside the procedure for mutual assistance in emergency
situations (Article 35 (6)). This is especially the case if the host country
discovers a risk to health and safety which requires immediate action. In such
cases the measures are to be notified to the Commission and the Member State
of establishment, stating the reasons for which the Member State considers that
there is urgency.
aa) Impact on standardisation of services
216 See, Roth, to be published in No. 5 Verbraucher und Recht 2007.
217 Home Country Control (also Country of Origin rule) is the rule of EU law, specifically of
Single Market law, that determines which laws will apply to goods or services that cross the
border of Member States. EU law requires that the goods or services produced legally in
one Member States should be allowed unhindered access to markets of other Member
States. The latter are not allowed to apply their laws except in specific circumstances
(taken from Wikipedia).
218 The country where the company offers its services.
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