Judgment — ECLI:EU:C:2002:195
Date: 2002-03-21
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Free movement of goods;Measures having equivalent effect;Quantitative restrictions;Freedom to provide services
Concepts: The various services
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Austria

SUMMARY — CASE C-451/99 
Summary of the Judgment 
1. Freedom to provide services — Treaty provisions — Scope — Leasing — Included 
(Art. 50 EC) 
2. Freedom to provide services — Restrictions — Obligation to register in the Member 
State of use vehicles leased from an undertaking established in another Member 
State — Justification — Powers of taxation of Member States in the taxation of 
motor vehicles — Conditions linked to the time-limit for registration, residence or 
establishment of the leasing undertaking, insurance, roadworthiness testing and the 
payment of a consumption tax — Not permissible — Criteria 
(Arts 49 EC to 55 EC) 
1. Leasing constitutes a service within the 
meaning of Article 50 EC. It consists of 
an economic activity provided for con­
sideration. The fact that that activity 
implies the handing over of goods by 
the lessor to the lessee cannot invali­
date that classification since the supply 
relates not so much to the goods 
themselves as to their use by the lessee, 
the goods in question remaining the 
property of the lessor. 
(see para. 18) 
2. Where a vehicle leased from a company 
established in one Member State is 
actually used on the road network of 
another Member State, the latter may 
impose an obligation for that vehicle to 
be registered in its territory, since 
registration is the natural corollary of 
the exercise of the powers of taxation 
which, subject to compliance with 
Community Law, Member States are 
free to exercise in the taxation of motor 
vehicles. The provisions of the Treaty 
on the freedom to provide services 
(Articles 49 EC to 55 EC) do, however, 
preclude legislation of a Member State 
which in such a case makes registration 
subject to one or more of the following 
conditions: 
— a time-limit for registration that is so 
short as to make it impossible or 
excessively difficult to comply with 
the obligations imposed, having 
regard to the formalities which must 
be completed; 
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CURA ANLAGEN 
—a requirement that the person in 
whose name the vehicle is registered 
in the Member State of use reside or 
have a place of business there, in so 
far as it obliges a leasing undertak­
ing either to have a principal place 
of business in that Member State or 
to accept registration of the vehicle 
in the name of the lessee and the 
consequent limitation of its rights 
over the vehicle; 
— a requirement to insure the vehicle 
with an authorised insurer in the 
Member State of use, if that require­
ment implies that the insurer must 
have its principal place of business 
in that Member State, as the home 
State within the meaning of the 
non-life insurance directives, and 
have Official authorisation' there; 
— a requirement of a roadworthiness 
test when the vehicle has already 
undergone such testing in the 
Member State where the leasing 
company is established, save where 
that requirement is aimed at veri­
fying that the vehicle satisfies the 
conditions imposed on vehicles reg­
istered in the Member State of use 
that are not covered by the tests 
carried out in the Member State 
where the leasing company is estab­
lished and/or, if the vehicle has in 
the meantime been used on the 
public highway, that its condition 
has not deteriorated since it was 
tested in that latter Member State, 
provided similar testing is imposed 
where a vehicle previously tested in 
the Member State of use is presented 
for registration in that State; 
— payment, in the Member State of 
use, of a consumption tax the 
amount of which is not proportion­
ate to the duration of the regis­
tration of the vehicle in that State. 
(see paras 40-42, 46, 71, operative part) 
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