6 September 2012: Opinion of the Advocate General Trstenjak: C-206/11 (Köck)
Yesterday, there was also an opinion issued in consumer law related case C-206/11 (Köck). The case concerned interpretation of the scope of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive 2005/29. In Austria if a company wants to announce a sale of its goods it has to first obtain a permit for it from a regional authority. Köck is a retail company in Innsbruck and announced such 'full sale', 'everything has to go' without the permit. In related proceedings against it, it claimed that the requirement to obtain such an administrative permit is contrary to the provisions of the Directive, since it does not follow a test of the unfairness of the commercial practice but prohibits such practices regardless of its potentially fair character.
Since I'm on holiday at the moment, the post is only a short summary of the case. The full description is likely to come with the judgment. In the meantime: Advocate Trstenjak concluded that the national provisions were not contrary to the provisions of the Directive, as long as the company had a possibility to claim in the proceedings against it that
