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

Hans-W. Micklitz
such as Standards Bodies they are legally obliged to control and supervise the
activities of these private entities 248 .
c) Private law means – liability for the safety of services
The very same Council Resolution notes
4. that the Commission report does not cover the issue of liability of service
providers, which is considered separately in the context of ongoing analysis of
the functioning of liability of the national liability systems; further notes that the
Commission’s commitment to follow-up any development of this issue and to
report to the Council at the appropriate stage.
After having been obliged to withdraw its 1991 proposal on the liability for
services 249 , the European Commission seems rather cautious in taking up the
issue again. Liability issues are part of the overall EC project on the codification
of European contract law. This seems to be the background to the somewhat
cryptic allusion in para 4 of the Council Resolution. However, the European
Commission has launched in 2003 a study on the “Comparative analysis of
national liability systems for remedying damage caused by defective consumer
services” which focused on tourism, sports and leisure, medical malpractice and
public goods. The study has been conducted by VIEW 250 . A revised and
supplemented version of the study has been published in 2006 251 .
No follow-up, however, seems to be envisaged. The Service Directive with its
non-mandatory rules on professional insurance liabilities and guarantees are
obviously regarded as an efficient and sufficient means to protect the
consumers Europe-wide against possible risks resulting from unsafe services.
Outside and beyond the envisaged Rome II regulation on extra-contractual
liabilities, this is to be understood as an appropriate and sufficient means to
deal with cross border consumer complaints 252 .
cc)
Impact on standardisation of Services
248 This is the basic finding of a study we have undertaken as early as 1988, see Joerges/Falke/Micklitz/Brüggemeier,
Die Sicherheit von Konsumgütern und die Entwicklung der Europäischen
Gemeinschaft.
249 OJ C 12, 18.1.1991, pp. 8 et seq, withdrawn 23.6.1994 COM (1994) 260 final;
Brüggemeier/Joerges, Europäisierung des Vertragsrechts und Haftungsrechts, in: Müller-
Graff (Hrsg.), Gemeinsames Privatrecht in der Europäischen Gemeinschaft, 1999, p. 301.
250 http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/cons_safe/keydocs/index_en.htm, see under various
reports.
251 Magnus/Micklitz, Liability for the Safety of Services, 2005.
252 Chapter II, II, 2.
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