Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Freedom to provide services — Treaty provisions — Scope — Temporary nature of the activities pursued — Criteria — Supply of identical or similar services with a greater or lesser degree of frequency or regularity in another Member State without having an infrastructure there — (Art. 50, third para., EC)

2. Freedom to provide services — Restrictions — Rules of a Member State which make the performance of services on its territory by businesses established in other Member States subject to a procedure for entry on the trades register — Not permissible — Criteria — (Art. 49 EC)

Summary

1. The mere fact that a business established in one Member State supplies identical or similar services with a greater or lesser degree of frequency or regularity in a second Member State, without having an infrastructure there which enables it to pursue a professional activity on a stable and continuous basis in the second Member State and from which it holds itself out to, amongst others, nationals of the second Member State, is not sufficient for it to be regarded as established in the second Member State.

"Services" within the meaning of the Treaty may cover services varying widely in nature, including services which are provided over an extended period, even over several years, where, for example, the services in question are supplied in connection with the construction of a large building. Services within the meaning of the Treaty may likewise be constituted by services which a business established in a Member State supplies with a greater or lesser degree of frequency or regularity, even over an extended period, to persons established in one or more other Member States, for example the giving of advice or information for remuneration.

No provision of the Treaty affords a means of determining, in an abstract manner, the duration or frequency beyond which the supply of a service or of a certain type of service in another Member State can no longer be regarded as the provision of services within the meaning of the Treaty but as coming under the chapter relating to the right of establishment.

see paras 29-32, 40, operative part

2. Community law on freedom to provide services precludes a business from being subject to an obligation to be entered on the trades register which delays, complicates or renders more onerous the provision of its services in the host Member State if the conditions prescribed by the directive governing recognition of professional qualifications which is applicable to pursuit of that activity in the host Member State are satisfied.

Once those conditions are satisfied, any entry required on the trades register of the host Member State cannot be other than automatic, and that requirement cannot constitute a condition precedent for the provision of services, result in administrative expense for the person providing them or give rise to an obligation to pay subscriptions to the chamber of trades.

That applies not only to providers of services who intend to supply services in the host Member State only occasionally, or even a single time, but also to those who supply or wish to supply services in a repeated or more or less regular manner.

see paras 37-38, 40, operative part