In the case of an action brought by an EU official against 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, adopted on the basis of Article 336 TFEU in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, the contested provisions fall within the category of legislative acts of general application, in respect of which, under the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU, the admissibility of actions for annulment brought by natural or legal persons is subject to compliance with the conditions of direct and individual concern.

In that regard, the condition of individual concern cannot be based on Articles 27 and 28 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. The fact that a person intervenes in some way in the process leading to the adoption of an act of the European Union is sufficient to distinguish that person individually as regards the act in question only if the applicable rules of the Union grant him certain procedural guarantees. Unless there is an explicit provision to the contrary, neither the process of drawing up measures of a general nature, nor the measures themselves, require, by virtue of general principles of Union law, such as the right to be heard, the participation of affected persons, their interests being deemed to be represented by the political bodies called upon to adopt those measures. In that regard, it is clear that neither Article 336 TFEU, nor Article 10 of the Staff Regulations, nor even Article 27 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, confer an individual procedural right on members of staff of the institutions of the European Union.

Moreover, whilst it is true that a person may be individually concerned by a measure because he is part of a limited class of economic operators when that measure alters rights acquired by him prior to its adoption, even if the applicant does belong to a limited group of officials on whom the contested provisions would have the effect of depriving them of their entitlement to reimbursement of travel expenses and to travelling time, that situation is not the result of a right acquired by those officials only. There was no acquired right in that sense, since, according to Article 7 of Annex V, and Article 8 of Annex VII, to the Staff Regulations applicable until 31 December 2013, entitlement to travel expenses and travelling time, regardless of the expatriation or foreign residence allowance, was, in fact, the right of all EU officials. Even if the consequence of the decision of the Parliament and the Council to link, by means of the contested provisions, entitlement to those rights to eligibility for an expatriation or foreign residence allowance is to deprive the applicant of those rights because of the legal and factual situation in which he, like other officials, now finds himself, it is not inconceivable that other officials will, in the future, find themselves in a situation analogous to his.

Moreover, the possibility of determining, at the time of the adoption of a contested measure, more or less precisely the number, or even the identity, of the persons to whom that measure applies by no means implies that it must be regarded as being of individual concern to them, as long as it is established that that application takes effect by virtue of an objective legal or factual situation defined by the measure in question.

(see paras 25, 31, 32, 37, 41, 45-48)