Staff case summary

Staff case summary Summary Judicial proceedings — Application initiating proceedings — Formal requirements — Application lodged by fax within the time-limit for bringing proceedings — Lawyer’s hand-written signature different from that on the original application received by post — Consequence — Date of receipt of fax not taken into account for assessing whether time-limit for bringing proceedings has been met (Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 34(1) and (6); Staff Regulations, Art. 91(3)) In European Union civil service proceedings, in order to lodge any pleading properly, the provisions of Article 34 of the Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, and particularly paragraph 1 and paragraph 6 thereof, which allows applications to be submitted by fax, require the representative of the party to sign the original pleading by hand before submitting it by fax and to lodge the same original document with the Tribunal Registry within the next ten days at the latest. That being so, if it is apparent retroactively that the original of the pleading which is physically lodged with the Registry within ten days of its submission by fax does not bear the same signature as that in the faxed document, it must be held that the Tribunal Registry received two separate pleadings, even if the signature was appended by the same person. Since it is not for the Tribunal to check whether both texts are the same word for word, it is clear that, where the signature appended to one of the two documents is not identical to the signature appended to the other, the faxed document is not a copy of the original document that was lodged by post. Moreover, if the submission of the faxed text does not satisfy the requirements of legal certainty laid down by Article 34 of the Rules of Procedure, the date on which the faxed document was lodged cannot be taken into account for the purpose of compliance with the time-limit for bringing proceedings. (see paras 20-21, 23) See: 13 November 2001, T‑138/01 R F v Court of Auditors , paras 8 and 9

ORDER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION CIVIL SERVICE TRIBUNAL

(Second Chamber)

17 October 2013

Luigi Marcuccio

v

European Commission

‛Civil service — Article 34(1) and (6) of the Rules of Procedure — Application lodged by fax within the period for bringing proceedings, extended on account of distance by a period of ten days — Application received by post within the following ten days — Applications not the same — Action out of time’

Application:

under Article 270 TFEU, applicable to the EAEC Treaty by virtue of Article 106a thereof, in which Mr Marcuccio requests the Tribunal, in particular, to annul the European Commission’s decision rejecting his request of 6 July 2011 and the decision rejecting his complaint of 19 February 2012, and to award him the sum of EUR 10 500 plus interest. The original application, lodged by post, was preceded by a document faxed on 29 October 2012, which was presented as a copy of the original application.

Held:

The action is dismissed as manifestly inadmissible. Mr Marcuccio is to bear his own costs.

Summary

Judicial proceedings — Application initiating proceedings — Formal requirements — Application lodged by fax within the time-limit for bringing proceedings — Lawyer’s hand-written signature different from that on the original application received by post — Consequence — Date of receipt of fax not taken into account for assessing whether time-limit for bringing proceedings has been met

(Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, Art. 34(1) and (6); Staff Regulations, Art. 91(3))

In European Union civil service proceedings, in order to lodge any pleading properly, the provisions of Article 34 of the Rules of Procedure of the Civil Service Tribunal, and particularly paragraph 1 and paragraph 6 thereof, which allows applications to be submitted by fax, require the representative of the party to sign the original pleading by hand before submitting it by fax and to lodge the same original document with the Tribunal Registry within the next ten days at the latest.

That being so, if it is apparent retroactively that the original of the pleading which is physically lodged with the Registry within ten days of its submission by fax does not bear the same signature as that in the faxed document, it must be held that the Tribunal Registry received two separate pleadings, even if the signature was appended by the same person. Since it is not for the Tribunal to check whether both texts are the same word for word, it is clear that, where the signature appended to one of the two documents is not identical to the signature appended to the other, the faxed document is not a copy of the original document that was lodged by post.

Moreover, if the submission of the faxed text does not satisfy the requirements of legal certainty laid down by Article 34 of the Rules of Procedure, the date on which the faxed document was lodged cannot be taken into account for the purpose of compliance with the time-limit for bringing proceedings.

(see paras 20-21, 23)

See:

13 November 2001, T‑138/01 R F v Court of Auditors, paras 8 and 9