Joined Cases C-84/19, C-222/19 and C-252/19: Judgment of the Court (First Chamber) of 3 September 2020 (requests for a preliminary ruling from the Sąd Rejonowy Szczecin — Prawobrzeże i Zachód w Szczecinie, Sąd Rejonowy w Opatowie — Poland) — Profi Credit Polska SA v QJ (C-84/19), BW v DR (C-222/19), QL v CG (C-252/19) (Reference for a preliminary ruling — Consumer protection — Directive 93/13/EEC — Article 1(2) — Scope — National provision providing for the maximum amount of non-interest credit costs — Article 3(1) — Contractual term passing on to the consumer costs of the lender’s business activity — Significant imbalance between the rights and obligations of the parties — Article 4(2) — Obligation to draft contract terms in plain intelligible language — Contractual terms which do not specify the services for which remuneration is sought — Directive 2008/48/EC — Article 3(g) — National legislation laying down a method of calculating the maximum non-interest credit cost which may be charged to the consumer)
Date: 2020-09-03
Institutions: Court of Justice
Subjects: consumer credit, consumer information, cost of borrowing, unfair terms of contract








C_2020378EN.01000701.xml










9.11.2020   


EN


Official Journal of the European Union


C 378/7






Judgment of the Court (First Chamber) of 3 September 2020 (requests for a preliminary ruling from the Sąd Rejonowy Szczecin — Prawobrzeże i Zachód w Szczecinie, Sąd Rejonowy w Opatowie — Poland) — Profi Credit Polska SA v QJ (C-84/19), BW v DR (C-222/19), QL v CG (C-252/19)
(Joined Cases C-84/19, C-222/19 and C-252/19) (1)

(Reference for a preliminary ruling - Consumer protection - Directive 93/13/EEC - Article 1(2) - Scope - National provision providing for the maximum amount of non-interest credit costs - Article 3(1) - Contractual term passing on to the consumer costs of the lender’s business activity - Significant imbalance between the rights and obligations of the parties - Article 4(2) - Obligation to draft contract terms in plain intelligible language - Contractual terms which do not specify the services for which remuneration is sought - Directive 2008/48/EC - Article 3(g) - National legislation laying down a method of calculating the maximum non-interest credit cost which may be charged to the consumer)
(2020/C 378/08)
Language of the case: Polish

Referring court

Sąd Rejonowy Szczecin — Prawobrzeże i Zachód w Szczecinie, Sąd Rejonowy w Opatowie

Parties to the main proceedings


Applicants: Profi Credit Polska SA (C-84/19), BW (C-222/19), QL (C-252/19)

Defendants: QJ (C-84/19), DR (C-222/19), CG (C-252/19)

Operative part of the judgment







1.


Article 3(g) and Article 22 of Directive 2008/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2008 on credit agreements for consumers and repealing Council Directive 87/102/EEC must be interpreted as not precluding a national provision on consumer credit that lays down a method of calculating the maximum non-interest credit cost which may be charged to the consumer, even if that calculation method allows the seller or supplier to have the consumer bear a proportion of the general costs relating to the exercise of his or her business activity, provided that, by means of its provisions relating to that maximum amount, that legislation is not contrary to the rules harmonised by that directive;










2.


Article 1(2) of Council Directive 93/13/EEC of 5 April 1993 on unfair terms in consumer contracts, as amended by Directive 2011/83/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2011, must be interpreted as meaning that a contractual term which sets the non-interest credit cost in accordance with the maximum upper limit laid down by national legislation on consumer credit, where that legislation provides that non-interest credit costs are not payable in respect of the part exceeding that upper limit or the total amount of credit, is not excluded from the scope of that directive;










3.


Article 4(2) of Directive 93/13, as amended by Directive 2011/83, must be interpreted as meaning that terms of a consumer credit agreement which impose on the consumer costs other than repayment of the principal loan amount and payment of interest do not fall within the exception provided for in that provision, where those terms do not specify either the nature of those costs or the services which they are intended to remunerate and where they are formulated in such a way as to give rise to confusion on the part of the consumer as to his or her obligations and the economic consequences of those terms, which it is for the referring court to ascertain;










4.


Article 3(1) of Directive 93/13, as amended by Directive 2011/83, must be interpreted as meaning that a contractual term relating to non-interest credit costs, which sets that cost below a statutory upper limit and which passes on, to the consumer, the costs of the lender’s economic activity, is liable to cause a significant imbalance in the parties’ rights and obligations arising under the contract to the detriment of the consumer, where it imposes on the consumer costs which are disproportionate to the services provided and to the amount of the loan received, which it is for the referring court to ascertain.






(1)  OJ C 164, 13.5.2019.

OJ C 280, 19.8.2019.