Rome 1 verordening: Uitspraken van het Hof over geschillen over contracten moeten EU-breed erkend worden (en)

The European Parliament approved the Rome I regulation, which is designed to improve the recognition and enforcement in all EU Member States of court judgments on contractual obligations. MEPs adopted the report by Cristian Dumitrescu (PES, RO) on the Rome I regulation. This adopted text, which reflects an agreement with Council for a first reading adoption, will provide common EU rules on the choice of the law to apply in case of cross-border disputes concerning contracts.

In order to improve the mutual enforcement of court judgments among Member States, EU -wide rules are needed governing the choice of the applicable law. It is important that, if citizens are free to choose the court where they can make their claim, they cannot simply choose the courts of one Member State rather than another just because the law is more favourable to their cause there (a practice known as "forum-shopping").

As a basic rule, two persons who stipulate a contract are free to choose the law applicable in the event of a dispute. If no choice is made, to avoid forum-shopping, the regulation would introduce common EU rules on the choice of the applicable law.

Rules for consumer-business conflicts

The approved text provides, as a general rule, that, in the case of a contract between a professional and a consumer, the latter should be advantaged by the choice of the court. In fact, the adopted states that the applicable law should in general be the most familiar one, i.e. the law of the country where the consumer has his habitual residence.

However, according to Members, this would be a costly solution for small and medium sized business (SMEs), which do not have resources to comply with 27 different national legislations. This would be particularly true for e-trade firms.

Therefore, the EP successfully proposed to make an exception to the general rule that consumer's law should always apply. In fact, it will be possible for the parties involved in the dispute to make a choice of law. This will enable an e-trader to be free to impose his law when proposing a contract to a consumer.

In addition, the approved regulation also provides that the choice of the applicable law is always subject to the rules of the consumer's country of residence, thus offering a solution that is at the same time consumer-friendly and small business-friendly.

Finally, Parliament has managed to preserve the exception for cases in which consumers are provided with services in another country. As a result, bed & breakfast businesses, for instance, will be free to advertise their services on the net without fearing to break national laws on consumers' protection.

As far as individual contracts of employment are concerned, where the law applicable has not been chosen by the parties, the contract would be governed by the law of the country in which the employee habitually carries out his work.

Family matters excluded from the legislation

Obligations arising out of family relationships, from matrimonial property regimes, wills and succession are excluded from the scope of the regulation.

The Parliament called on the Commission to present, no later than two years after the date of application, a report on the implementation of this regulation.

Together with the recently approved Rome II regulation on non-contractual matters, this regulation provides a complete set of Community rules of private international law relating to contractual and non-contractual obligations.