In the light of the general scheme of the Staff Regulations and, in particular, of Articles 25 and 26 thereof, a decision to classify an official in function group AD in the different types of posts listed in Article 30(2) of Annex XIII to the Staff Regulations, as amended by Regulation No 1023/2013, involving consequences for his eligibility for promotion, must, like decisions on appointment or establishment as an official, be duly notified by the appointing authority to the official concerned, since it is for the appointing authority to ensure that those decisions actually reach their addressee or, as the case may be, that the addressee is duly apprised of them. However, the appointing authority has a number of options for notifying administrative decisions, including electronic means, and is not therefore required to use the postal service for that purpose.

With regard to a decision of the appointing authority classifying an official in grade AD 12 in a type of post introduced by Regulation No 1023/2013 amending the Staff Regulations of Officials of the European Union and the Conditions of Employment of Other Servants of the European Union, where that decision was shown, from 1 January 2014, by the inclusion of a reference in the official’s individual file in the ‘SysPer 2’ staff management information system to his classification in a type of post, that classification in a type of post is indeed an act adversely affecting the official since, in so far as he was, on 31 December 2013, an official in grade AD 12, he could potentially be classified by the appointing authority, under Article 30(2)(c) or (e) of Annex XIII to the Staff Regulations, only in one of the two types of post for that grade, i.e. ‘Head of unit or equivalent’ or ‘Administrator’, it being understood that, pursuant to Article 30(2)(d) of that Annex, the type of post ‘Adviser or equivalent’ is reserved for officials in grades AD 13 and AD 14. Thus, if the appointing authority decided to classify the official concerned in the residual type of post ‘Administrator’, it also decided, by implication, that the official did not occupy, on 31 December 2013, a post of ‘Head of unit or equivalent’.

In that regard, the official concerned cannot reasonably claim that his complaint was late because he was not properly aware of the existence of the classification decision until he was notified of the list of AD 12 officials eligible for promotion, nor can he rely on excusable error. In addition to the fact that new provisions of the Staff Regulations, in so far as they are adopted by means of regulations pursuant to Article 336 TFEU, have to be published in the Official Journal of the European Union, and that from the date of their publication they constitute the substantive rules of which any official exercising normal care is deemed to be aware, the general implementing provisions and decisions on types of posts adopted by the administration should have alerted an official in grade AD 12 exercising normal care, particularly where he is in a senior legal post in a legal department, to the fact that, unless he was recognised as holding ’special responsibilities’, the entry into force of the reform of the Staff Regulations and the classification in types of posts meant that he would very probably be classified in the type of post ‘Administrator’ and would therefore be capped in his grade.

That being so, notification of the list of AD 12 officials eligible for promotion, in so far as it excluded the official concerned, merely implemented the classification decision, and could not, in a case where the official claims to have omitted to enquire about his classification even though that information was available and easily accessible, create a new time-limit for him to lodge a complaint against the decision concerned.

(see paras 49, 51, 52, 55, 60)

Judgment of 12 July 1989 in Binder, 161/88, EU:C:1989:312, para. 19

Judgment of 19 May 1999 in Connolly v Commission, T‑34/96 and T‑163/96, EU:T:1999:102, para. 168

Orders of 14 January 2014 in Lebedef v Commission, F‑60/13, EU:F:2014:6, paras 44, 48 and 51, and 20 March 2014 in Michel v Commission, F‑44/13, EU:F:2014:40, para. 53