Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Jurisdiction of the Court — Limits — Classification of goods under tariff headings in the Common Customs Tariff (Art. 267 TFEU)

2. Common Customs Tariff — Tariff headings — Screens able to reproduce data from an automatic data processing machine and composite video signals — Classification under subheading 8471 60 90 or 8528 21 90 of the Combined Nomenclature — Conditions — Determination by the national court on the basis of objective characteristics and properties mentioned in the Explanatory Notes relating to the Harmonised System

(Council Regulation No 2658/87, Annex I)

3. Common Customs Tariff — Classification of goods — Regulation No 754/2004 — No retroactive effects

(Commission Regulation No 754/2004)

Summary

1. See the text of the decision.

(see paras 32, 33)

2. For the purpose of tariff classification in the Combined Nomenclature set out in Annex I to Regulation No 2658/87 on the tariff and statistical nomenclature and on the Common Customs Tariff, in the versions resulting successively from Regulation No 2388/2000, Regulation No 2031/2001, Regulation No 1832/2002, and Regulation No 1789/2003 of colour plasma-screens with a diagonal measurement of the screen of 106.6 cm, with two loudspeakers and a remote control with an input device designed for the insertion of a video card, account should be taken of their inherent intended purpose, which consists in reproducing, on one hand, the data from an automatic data-processing machine and, on the other, from composite video signals. Such screens must be classified under subheading 8471 60 90 of the Combined Nomenclature if they are used solely or mainly in an automatic data-processing system, within the meaning of Note 5B(a) of Chapter 84 of the Combined Nomenclature, or under subheading 8528 21 90 thereof if that is not the case, which is a matter for the referring court to determine on the basis of the objective characteristics of the screens at issue, and in particular those mentioned in the Explanatory Notes relating to heading 8471 of the Harmonised Commodity Description and Coding System established by the International Convention on the Harmonised Commodity Description and Coding System and its amending protocol, in particular, in points 1 to 5 of the part of Chapter I D relating to display units for automatic data-processing machines.

The mere fact that screens are able to display images coming from sources other than an automatic data-processing machine does not preclude their classification in heading 8471 of the Combined Nomenclature, having regard to Note 5(B)(a) to Chapter 84 of the Combined Nomenclature, which refers to units used ‘solely or mainly’ in an automatic data-processing system. It is apparent from the Explanatory Notes relating to Heading 8471 cited above that monitors used principally in an automatic data-processing system can be identified not only by the fact that they are fitted with standard sockets for connection to data-processing systems, but also by other technical characteristics, in particular by the fact that they are intended to be viewed close up, that they cannot display television signals, that they have low magnetic field emissions, that their display pitch starts at 0.41 mm for medium resolution and gets smaller as the resolution increases, that their bandwidth is 15 MHz or greater and that the dimension of the pixels on the screen is smaller than for video monitors in heading 8528 of the HS, whereas the convergence of the former is greater than that of the latter.

(see paras 49, 51, 54, operative part 1)

3. Regulation No 754/2004 concerning the classification of certain goods in the Combined Nomenclature cannot be applied retroactively.

Nothing in the preamble to that regulation, in the wording of its provisions or in its annex suggests that that regulation is to be applied retroactively.

(see paras 57, 59, operative part 2)