Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:1998:135
Date: 1998-03-26
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Taxation;Principles, objectives and tasks of the Treaties
Procedure: Reference for a preliminary ruling
Origin: Italy

Summary of the Judgment 
1. Community law — Direct effect — National charges incompatible with Community law — 
Repayment — Procedures — Application of national law — Time-limits — Whether permis­
sible — Conditions — Observance of the principle of effectiveness of Community law — 
Observance of the principle of equivalence of conditions for actions for recovery with those 
for similar claims under domestic law 
2. Acts of the institutions — Directives — Direct effect — Consequences — Possibility of enforcing 
against individuals national rules concerning time-limits for instituting proceedings before 
proper transposition of a directive — Whether permissible — Conditions 
I - 4997 
SUMMARY — CASE C-260/96 
1. In the absence of Community rules on 
reimbursement of national charges levied 
though not due, it is for the domestic legal 
system of each Member State to designate 
the courts and tribunals having jurisdic­
tion and to lay down the detailed proce­
dural rules governing actions for safe­
guarding rights which individuals derive 
from Community law, provided, first, that 
such rules are not less favourable than 
those governing similar domestic actions 
(principle of equivalence) and, second, that 
they do not render virtually impossible or 
excessively difficult the exercise of rights 
conferred by Community law (principle 
of effectiveness). 
As regards the principle of effectiveness, it 
is compatible with Community law to lay 
down reasonable time-limits for bringing 
proceedings in the interests of legal cer­
tainty which protects both the taxpayer 
and the administration concerned. Such 
time-limits are not liable to render virtu­
ally impossible or excessively difficult the 
exercise of rights conferred by Commu­
nity law. In that regard, a time-limit of 
three years under national law, reckoned 
from the date of the contested payment, 
appears reasonable. 
Observance of the principle of equivalence 
implies, for its part, that the procedural 
rule at issue applies without distinction to 
actions alleging infringements of Commu­
nity law and to those alleging infringe­
ments of national law, with respect to the 
same kind of charges or dues. That prin­
ciple cannot, however, be interpreted as 
obliging a Member State to extend its most 
favourable rules governing recovery under 
national law to all actions for repayment 
of charges or dues levied in breach of 
Community law. Thus, Community lav/ 
does not preclude the legislation of a 
Member State from laying down, along­
side a limitation period applicable under 
the ordinary law to actions between pri­
vate individuals for the recovery of sums 
paid but not due, special detailed rules, 
which are less favourable, governing claims 
and legal proceedings to challenge the 
imposition of charges and other levies. The 
position would be different only if those 
detailed rules applied solely to actions 
based on Community law for the repay­
ment of such charges or levies. 
It follows that Community law does not 
prohibit a Member State from resisting 
actions for repayment of charges levied in 
breach of Community law by relying on 
a time-limit under national law of three 
years, by way of derogation from the 
ordinary rules governing actions between 
private individuals for the recovery of sums 
paid but not due, for which the period 
allowed is more favourable, provided that 
that time-limit applies in the same way to 
actions based on Community law for 
repayment of such charges as to those 
based on national law. 
2. Community law does not prevent a 
Member State from resisting actions for 
I - 4998 
MINISTERO DELLE FINANZE v SPAC 
repayment of charges levied in breach of 
a directive by relying on a time-limit under 
national law which is reckoned from the 
date of payment of the charges in ques­
tion, even if, at that date, the directive 
concerned had not yet been properly trans­
posed into national law, provided, first, 
that that time-limit is not less favourable 
for actions based on Community law than 
for those based on domestic law and that 
it does not render virtually impossible o r 
excessively difficult the exercise of rights 
conferred by Community law and, second, 
provided that it is not established that the 
conduct of the national authorities, in con­
junction with the existence of the con­
tested time-limit, had the effect of depriving 
the plaintiff of any opportunity of 
enforcing his rights before the national 
courts. 
I - 4999