Commission Regulation (EC) No 1920/2001 of 28 September 2001 laying down detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 2494/95 as regards minimum standards for the treatment of service charges proportional to transaction values in the harmonised index of consumer prices and amending Regulation (EC) No 2214/96 (Text with EEA relevance)
Date: 2001-09-28
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: consumer price, financial services, harmonisation of prices, price index

L 261/46

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Official Journal of the European Communities

29.9.2001

COMMISSION REGULATION (EC) No 1920/2001

of 28 September 2001

laying down detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 2494/95 as
regards minimum standards for the treatment of service charges proportional to transaction values
in the harmonised index of consumer prices and amending Regulation (EC) No 2214/96

(Text with EEA relevance)

THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European
Community,

Having regard to Council Regulation (EC) No 2494/95 of 23
October 1995 concerning harmonised indices of consumer
prices (1), as last amended by Commission Regulation (EC) No
1617/1999 (2), and in particular Article 4 and Article 5(3)
thereof,

Having regard to the opinion of the European Central Bank (3),

(5)

(6)

for the treatment of such charges is necessary to ensure
that the resulting HICPs meet the comparability require-
ment as laid down in Article 4 of Regulation (EC) No
2494/95.

The treatment of service charges that are expressed as a
proportion of transaction values should be consistent
with the treatment of goods and services in the health,
education and social protection sectors as laid down in
Council Regulation (EC) No 2166/1999 (8).

The measures provided for in this Regulation are in
Statistical
accordance with
Programme Committee established by Council Decision
89/382/EEC, Euratom (9),

opinion

the

the

of

Whereas:

(1)

(2)

(3)

By virtue of Article 5(1)(b) of Regulation (EC) No 2494/
95, each Member State is required to produce a harmo-
nised index of consumer prices (HICP) starting with the
index for January 1997.

Commission Regulation (EC) No 1749/96 of 9
September 1996 on initial implementing measures for
Council Regulation (EC) No 2494/95 concerning harmo-
nised indices of consumer prices (4), as last amended by
Council Regulation (EC) No 1688/98 (5), defines the
coverage of the HICP as those goods and services which
are included in household final monetary consumption
expenditure and requires coverage of COICOP/HICP
class 12.5.1 ‘Financial services n.e.c.’ in full by December
1999 without specific exclusion of charges expressed as
a proportion of the transaction value.

Commission Regulation (EC) No 2214/96 of 20
November 1996 concerning harmonised indices of
consumer prices:
transmission and dissemination of
subindices of the HICP (6), as last amended by Regulation
(EC) No 1749/1999 (7), requires a harmonised subindex
for COICOP/HICP expenditure class 12.6.2 ‘Other finan-
cial services n.e.c.’ excluding interest payments and
charges expressed as a proportion of the transaction
value.

(4)

There is considerable scope for non-comparability by
excluding service charges that are expressed as a propor-
tion of transaction values; a harmonised methodology

(1) OJ L 257, 27.10.1995, p. 1.
(2) OJ L 192, 24.7.1999, p. 9.
(3) OJ C 244, 1.9.2001, p. 5.
(4) OJ L 229, 10.9.1996, p. 3.
(5) OJ L 214, 31.7.1998, p. 23.
(6) OJ L 296, 21.11.1996, p. 8.
(7) OJ L 214, 13.8.1999, p. 1.

HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Aim

The aim of this Regulation is to amend Annex II to Regulation
(EC) No 2214/96 concerning the subindices of the harmonised
indices of consumer prices, hereafter referred to as ‘HICP’, as
regards the coverage of financial services, and to set minimum
standards for the treatment of service charges proportional to
transaction values in order to ensure that they are reliable and
relevant and meet the comparability requirements as laid down
in Article 4 of Regulation (EC) No 2494/95.

Article 2

Definitions

1.
Interest payments and interest-like charges cover nominal
interest payments and all elements included in the calculation
of effective interest.

2. Where service charges are defined as a proportion of the
the purchaser prices are defined as the
transaction value,
proportion itself, multiplied by the value of a representative
unit transaction in the base or reference period.

(8) OJ L 266, 14.10.1999, p. 1.
(9) OJ L 181, 28.6.1989, p. 47.

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Article 3

Article 4

Treatment of service charges

Financial services n.e.c.

1.
The HICP subindices concerned shall be calculated using
a formula which is consistent with the Laspeyres-type formula
used for other subindices. They shall reflect the price change on
the changed expenditure of maintaining the
the basis of
consumption pattern of households and the composition of the
consumer population in the base or reference period.

(a) The purchaser prices of services to be used in the HICP
shall be the actual charges levied directly on consumers in
exchange for the service provided. The HICP shall include
charges expressed as a flat fee or flat rate.

(b) Changes in purchaser prices which reflect changes in the
rules determining them shall be shown as price changes in
the HICP.

(c) Changes in the purchaser prices resulting from changes in
the values of the representative unit transactions shall be
shown as price changes in the HICP.

(d) The representative unit transactions shall be expressed in
physical terms, except where this is not appropriate or
possible,
in which case they shall be expressed in the
currency of the Member State.

(e) The change in the values of the representative unit transac-
tions may be estimated by the change in a price index
transactions
which represents
concerned. Where they exist, HICP subindices or aggregate
indices shall be deemed appropriate for this purpose.

appropriately the unit

2. Where the specification changes, prices shall be treated in
accordance with the rules on specification changes, and in
particular those regarding quality adjustment as laid down in
Article 5 of Regulation (EC) No 1749/96.

3. Where services have been made available to consumers
free of charge and subsequently an actual price is charged, the
change from zero to an actual price, and vice versa, shall be
reflected in the HICP.

4. Where services jointly provided with other goods or
services have been made available to consumers free of an
explicit charge and subsequently are charged for on a separate
basis, the change shall be reflected in the HICP.

5. Where relevant, the procedure provided for in Article 5
of Commission Regulation (EC) No 2646/98 (1) concerning
tariffs shall apply mutatis mutandis.

(1) OJ L 335, 10.12.1998, p. 30.

The contents of class 12.6.2, ‘Other financial services n.e.c. (S)’,
in Annex II to Regulation (EC) No 2214/96 concerning the
subindices of the harmonised indices of consumer prices, are
replaced by the following text:

‘12.6.2. Other financial services n.e.c. (S)

— actual charges for the financial services of banks, post
offices, saving banks, money changers and similar
financial

institutions,

— fees and service charges of brokers, investment counsel-

lors, tax consultants and the like.

Excludes: Interest payments and interest-like charges of any
kind and administrative charges of private pension funds
and the like.’

Article 5

Other services n.e.c.

The contents of class 12.7.0, ‘Other services n.e.c (S)’, in Annex
II to Regulation (EC) No 2214/96 concerning the subindices of
the harmonised indices of consumer prices, are replaced by the
following text:

‘12.7.0. Other services n.e.c. (S)

— fees for legal services, employment agencies, etc.,

— charges for undertaking and other funeral services,

— payment for the services of housing agents, auctioneers,

salesroom operators and other intermediaries,

— payment for photocopies and other reproductions of

documents,

— fees for the issue of birth, marriage and death certi-

ficates and other administrative documents,

— payment for newspaper notices and advertisements,

— payment for the services of graphologists, astrologers,
private detectives, bodyguards, matrimonial agencies
and marriage guidance counsellors, public writers,
miscellaneous concessions (seats, toilets, cloakrooms),
etc.

Includes: Payments
connection with rental transactions.

for

services of housing agents

in

Excludes: Following the conventions of ESA 1995, excluded
are contributions and dues for membership of professional
associations, churches and social, cultural, recreational and
sports clubs (ESA 1995, paragraph 3.77.e) and commis-
sions to estate agents in connection with the sale or
purchase of non-financial assets (“Gross fixed capital forma-
tion” according to ESA 1995, paragraphs 3.102, 3.105(a),
3.111, 3.115).’

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Article 6

Basic information

Article 8

Quality control

1.
The basic information shall be all purchaser prices and
weights which are necessary to compute HICP subindices in
accordance with the provisions of this Regulation.

2.
The statistical units called upon by the Member States to
cooperate in the collection or provision of basic information
are obliged to give honest and complete information at the
time it is requested and allow the organisations and institutions
responsible for compiling official statistics, on request,
to
obtain information at the level of detail necessary to evaluate
compliance with the comparability requirements and the
quality of the HICP subindices.

Article 7

Comparability

HICPs constructed following the provisions of this Regulation
or following other procedures which do not result in an index
which differs systematically by more than one tenth of one
percentage point on average over one year against the previous
year from an index compiled following those procedures, shall
be deemed comparable.

Member States shall provide the Commission (Eurostat) with
information on the procedures developed for the treatment of
services charges proportional to transaction values where these
procedures differ from those specified in Article 3 of this
Regulation, before such procedures are used.

Article 9

Implementation

this Regulation shall be applied by the
The provisions of
Member States in December 2001 and take effect with the
index for January 2002.

Article 10

Entry into force

This Regulation shall enter
into force on the 20th day
following its publication in the Official Journal of the European
Communities.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

Done at Brussels, 28 September 2001.

For the Commission

Pedro SOLBES MIRA

Member of the Commission