Cross-border Debt Recovery Blog
by Marco Sposini
Laywer, Milan Bar Association
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The Court of Justice on Articles 3(1), 4, 5 and 6 of Directive 93/13/EEC on unfair terms in consumer contracts
27 April 2023
The Court of Justice of the European Union, by judgment ECLI:EU:C:2023:311, dated 20 April 2023, in Case C-263/22 – in proceedings between Ocidental – Companhia Portuguesa de Seguros de Vida SA, an insurance company with its registered office in Portugal, and LP, a consumer, concerning the refusal by the former to make loan repayments further to the permanent invalidity of the latter, as an insured person, on account of the alleged nullity or inapplicability of the insurance contract between Ocidental and LP – ruled that:
1- Article 4(2) and Article 5 of Directive 93/13/EEC on unfair terms in consumer contracts, read in the light of the 20th recital of that directive, must be interpreted as meaning that a consumer must always be afforded the opportunity, before the conclusion of a contract, to become acquainted with all the terms that the latter contract contains.
2- Article 3(1) and Articles 4 to 6 of Directive 93/13 must be interpreted as meaning that where a term of an insurance contract relating to the exclusion or limitation of cover against the insured risk, with which the consumer concerned could not have become acquainted prior to the conclusion of that contract, is found to be unfair by the national court, that court is required to exclude the application of that term in order that it may not produce binding effects with regard to that consumer.
The text is available here