EU magistrate: Truck makers can’t dodge price-fixing case

LUXEMBOURG (CN) — European Union time limitations for price-fixing complaints override national limits, a magistrate for the EU's highest court said Thursday.

Advocate General Athanasios Rantos wrote in his nonbinding opinion for the European Court of Justice that Spanish truck owners have five years to bring price-fixing complaints, despite a national law setting a one-year time limit. The opinion is not available in English.

The case was referred to the Court of Justice by the Provincial Court of León after a truck owner brought a suit in 2018 against Volvo and DAF Trucks alleging anticompetitive behavior. 

Two years earlier, the European Commission, the EU’s executive body, levied a recording-breaking $3 billion fine against a group of truck makers for colluding to fix prices for medium and heavy truck. A five-year investigation by the commission found MAN, Volvo/Renault, Daimler, Iveco and DAF broke EU competition rules for 14 years, meeting in a hotel in Brussels to discuss their price lists. The group manufactured nine out of every 10 medium and heavy trucks sold in Europe.

R.M., as the Spanish complainant is identified in court documents, bought three DAF and Volvo trucks between 2006 and 2007. When he complained about the price of the trucks in 2018, the companies argued that, under Spanish law, he needed to file his suit within a year of the commission’s findings. However, a 2014 EU Directive addressing anticompetitive behaviors allows for a five-year window. 

Under EU law, victims should be given sufficient time to make their claims, Rantos said Thursday.

“The one-year period provided for in the Spanish legislation is significantly shorter than the five-year period provided for in the directive,” he wrote. 

The magistrate found that the clock should start ticking from when the decision is entered in the Official Journal of the European Union - the official gazette of record for the EU - not from the date the commission issued a press release. In this case, the fine was made public in July 2016 but not entered into the record until April 2017.

“It cannot be presumed that, following a simple publication of a press release from the commission on its website, the injured party concerned has become aware of all the information essential to the exercise of the right to a claim for damages,” Rantos wrote.

Final rulings from the Luxembourg-based court follow the reasoning of advocate general opinions in about 80% of cases. A decision is expected in the coming months. 

Two other cases from the 2016 fine have come before the Court of Justice. In July the court held in RH v. Volvo that victims can bring a complaint before a court either in the place where the vehicle was purchased or where they resided. Earlier this month, the court clarified when victims can bring suits against subsidiaries of cartel members in Sumal v Mercedes Benz Trucks España. 

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