Judgment — ECLI:EU:T:2001:10
Date: 2001-01-17
Language of the case: French
Court formation: Fourth Chamber
Based on: Merger Treaty (1965)
Subject matter: Staff regulations and employment conditions - EC
Concepts: Mandatory nature;Starting point and calculation;Recovery of undue payment
Procedure: Staff cases - unfounded

SUMMARY - CASET-14/99 
Summary 
1. Officials — Actions — Prior complaint through official channels — Time-limits 
— Public policy 
(Staff Regulations, Arts 90 and 91) 
2. Officials — Actions — Time-limits — Point from which time starts to run -
Notification — Burden of proof of notification 
(Staff Regulations, Art. 91) 
3. Officials — Recovery of undue payment — Conditions 
(Staff Regulations, Art. 85) 
1. An official's action is admissible whether it is directed against the initial decision 
alone, the decision rejecting the complaint or both, provided that the complaint and 
the appeal were brought within the periods prescribed by Articles 90 and 91 of the 
Staff Regulations. Those time-limits are intended to ensure legal certainty. They are 
therefore a matter of public policy and cannot be left to the discretion of the parties 
or the Court. The fact that an institution, for reasons related to its staff policy, deals 
with the substance of an administrative complaint which is submitted out of time 
does not have the effect of derogating from the system of mandatory time-limits laid 
down in Articles 90 and 91 of the Staff Regulations, or of depriving the 
administration of its right at the stage of court proceedings to raise an objection of 
inadmissibility on the ground that the complaint was out of time. 
(see paras 19-20) 
See: 126/87 Del Plato v Commission [1989] ECR 643, para. 9; T-6/90 Petrilli v 
Commission [1990] ECR II-765, para. 26; T-112/94 Moat v Commission [1995] ECR-SC 
I-A-37 and II-135, para. 20 
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KRAUS v COMMISSION 
2. It is the responsibility of the party alleging that an action is out of time, having 
regard to the time-limit laid down by the Staff Regulations, to prove on what date 
the contested decision was notified. 
(see para. 22) 
See: T-197/98 Rudolph v Commission [2000] ECR-SC I-A-55 and II-241, para. 43, and 
the case-law cited therein 
3. Under Article 85 of the Staff Regulations, '[a]ny sum overpaid shall be recovered 
if the recipient was aware that there was no due reason for the payment or if the fact 
of the overpayment was patently such that he could not have been unaware of it'. 
It is the responsibility of the administration to prove that the recipient was aware of 
the absence of any due reason for the payment in question. If the recipient denies 
that he was aware of the fact that there was no due reason for the payment, the 
circumstances in which the payment at issue was made must be examined in order 
to establish whether the fact that there was no due reason for that payment was 
patently such that the recipient could not have been unaware of it. 
The phrase 'patently such' must be interpreted as meaning that it is not a question 
of knowing whether or not the error was obvious to the administration, but whether 
it was obvious to the person concerned. The latter, far from not needing to make 
any effort to reflect or check, is, on the contrary, required to make repayment 
where the error is one which does not escape the notice of an official exercising 
ordinary care, who is deemed to know the rules governing his salary. 
In that regard, it is not necessary for the official concerned, in the exercise of his 
duty of diligence, to be able to determine the precise extent of the error made by 
the administration. On the contrary, the fact that he has doubts about the validity of 
the payments in question is sufficient for him to be obliged to contact the 
administration so that it can carry out the necessary checks. It follows that an 
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SUMMARY - CASE T-14/99 
official who receives a household allowance, who is in possession of all the relevant 
information, that is to say, his spouse's earned income and the annual ceilings 
specified in the administrative notices sent to all officials, is in a position, by 
exercising ordinary care, to be aware of the error made by the administration in the 
payment of his household allowance from the time of his entry into service. 
(see paras 36-38, 40-42) 
See: 142/78 Berghmans v Commission [1979] ECR 3125, para. 9; T-122/95 Chabert v 
Commission [1996] ECR-SC I-A-19 and II-63, para. 35; T-156/96 Jensen v Commission 
[1998] ECR-SC I-A-411 and II-1173, para. 63, and the case-law cited therein 
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