Buying Goods & Services in France

(source: European Union)

1. The protection provided by Community law

The general safety requirement:

In order to protect your health and safety, Community law provides that producers may place only safe products on the market. In other words, any product supplied in the course of a commercial activity and intended for consumers or likely to be used by consumers must not present any risk or only the minimum risks compatible with the product's use in normal or reasonably foreseeable conditions, such as the risks of suffering a fall intrinsic to the normal use of a bicycle, the robustness and reliability of whose safety equipment - such as brakes, etc. - is not in dispute.

You should know that to ensure that products meet this high level of health and safety protection producers must notably take into account:

• the characteristics of the product, such as its composition or packaging,
• the effects of this product on other products, where it is reasonably foreseeable that it will be used with other products,
• the presentation of the product, the labelling, any instructions for its use and disposal,
• the categories of consumers at serious risk when using the product, in particular children.

Moreover, distributors are required to act with due care in regard to product safety, in particular by not supplying products which they know or should have presumed on the basis of the information in their possession, do not comply with the rules.

In addition to this general rule, sectoral provisions have been adopted to do justice the more sensitive nature of certain products. In particular these include foodstuffs, pharmaceutical products, cosmetic products, toys and household electrical appliances. At any rate, when a consumer product of a certain brand or type is deemed to be dangerous, the market surveillance authorities are entitled to take any measure dictated by the urgency or severity of the situation, such as measures banning sale of the product or ordering a product recall.

The Community rules also require that these authorities establish systems for the exchange of information between themselves and the Commission. Thus, action may be taken at the appropriate level. Moreover, abuse of the CE marking or its absence on toys or their packaging, or on household electrical appliances, constitutes an infringement of Community law, and dissuasive penalties may be imposed in accordance with procedures laid down by the individual Member States.

Liability for defective products: 

There are also Community rules governing liability for defective products. In other words, if you have been harmed by a defective product, the producer, the importer and, in certain circumstances, the supplier will be liable for damage caused by the fact that the product did not offer the safety which may reasonably be expected. In evaluating a product's defectiveness, the main criteria are its presentation and the use to which it could reasonably be expected to be put. If you are harmed you are entitled to compensation for physical injury and material damage caused by the defective product, even if the producer has not been at fault. To obtain damages, all you are required to do is to prove the damage, the defect, and the causal relationship between defect and damage.

However, there is a ceiling on compensation for most material damage. Moreover, plaintiffs must bring proceedings within three years of the date on which they became aware, or should reasonably have become aware, of the damage, the defect and the identity of the producer. As well, actions may only be brought within 10 years from the date on which the product was put into circulation.

Note that liability for primary agricultural products and game is subject to the liability rules of the individual Member States.

Each EU country must guarantee the protection provided by Community law in regard to general product safety and liability for defective products. This is why, in the following section, you will find the essential points which an individual who has been harmed by a defective or dangerous product must know in order to react effectively and to exercise his rights properly.

The information contained in Part 2 has been provided by the French authorities.

II. Useful information on specific provisions contained in French Law

The DGCCRF (Directorate General for Competition, Consumer Affairs and the Suppression of Fraud) - a directorate subject to the authority of the Minister for the Economy and Finance, in charge of consumer affairs - is responsible for implementing consumer protection and safety measures. It has local services throughout France, with 22 regional directorates in the capital of each region and 101 departmental directorates in the capital of each department.

The DGCCRF's powers in regard to the safety of products and services are set out in Book II of the Consumer Code.

Sector of competence: 

The DGCCRF regulates and monitors all products and services, including both food and non-food products.

Powers of intervention: 

The Consumer Code empowers DGCCRF officials to identify and ascertain infringements of safety legislation. It also authorises them to take samples and to require professionals to provide all information relevant to assessing the danger associated with a given product or service. To this end, it may order the provisional withdrawal from the market - pending further investigation - of products suspected of being harmful to consumer health or safety and may have them permanently withdrawn if the suspicion is confirmed.

The Consumer Code also empowers the public authorities to take permanent or temporary regulatory measures prohibiting the manufacture, importation, exportation or placing on the market of products that endanger the health and safety of consumers or ordering their seizure or destruction. The Code also entitles them to enjoin the dissemination of warnings or precautions for use or product recalls with a view to replacement or alterations or full or partial refund in respect of the unsafe product or service.

All texts adopted under the Consumer Code provide for penalties in the event of infringement. Generally fines are imposed; these sanctions may be increased by the courts, which may order, at the defendant's expense: - publication of the Court's ruling; - withdrawal or destruction of the offending products; - seizure of all or some of the offending products on the market.

Control measures: 

Each year the DGCCRF performs numerous controls in the field of product safety and the safety of services. In 1996 it performed 158,000 safety controls: 137,000 concerned food products and 21,000 industrial products (miscellaneous electrical appliances, suntanning equipment, garden machinery, folding chairs, bicycle helmets, toys, childcare articles) and services (swimming pools, playgrounds, sports equipment, diving centres).

III. Reference texts

Community texts: 

• Council Directive 92/59/EEC of 29 June 1992 on General Product Safety (published in the Official Journal of the European Communities No L 228 of 11.8.92, p. 24). 
• Directive 85/374/EEC of 25 July 1985 on liability for defective products (published in the Official Journal of the European Communities No L 210 of 7.8.85, p. 29)

National texts: 

• Code de la consommation Livre II : Conformité et sécurité des produits et des services Article L 211-1 à L 225-1
• Décrets n° 79-489 du 20/06/1979 portant interdiction de la fabrication, de l'importation, de l'offre, de la vente de la distribution à titre gratuit et de la détenton des vêtements et textiles traités avec le produit tris (tri 2,3 dibromopropyl orthophosphate).
• n° 88-466 du 28/04/1988 relatif aux produits contenant de l'amiante.
• n° 89-662 du 12/09/1989 relatif à la prévention des risques résultant de l'usage des jouets.
• n° 90-274 du 26/03/1990 relatif aux produits dits " poppers " contenant des nitrites de butyle et de pentyle.
• n° 90-847 du 24/09/1990 interdisant la fabrication, l'importation, l'exportation et la vente de textiles et vêtements traités à l'oxyde de triaziridinylphosphine ou au polybromobiphenyle.
• n° 90-897 du 01/10/1990 portant réglementation des artifices de divertissement.
• n° 91-1175 du 13/11/1991 portant application de la loi du 21 juillet 1983 relative à la sécurité des consommateurs en ce qui concerne certains objets. n° 91-1292 du 20/12/1991 relatif à la prévention des risques résultant de l'usage des articles de puériculture. n° 92-491 du 04/06/1992 relatif à la sécurité des matériels mis à la disposition du public dans les laveries automatiques.
• n° 92-985 du 09/09/1992 relatif à la prévention des risques résultant de l'usage de certains produits imitant des denrées alimentaires.
• n° 92-987 du 10/09/1992 portant application de la loi du 21 juillet 1983 relative à la sécurité des consommateurs en ce qui concerne les dispositifs et transformations visant à augmenter la puissance du moteur des cyclomoteurs.
• n° 92-1280 du10/12/1992 édictant les prescriptions de sécurité relatives aux poêles mobiles à pétrole lanpant désaromatisé ou non.
• n° 94-699du 10/08/1994 fixant les exigences de sécurité relatives aux équipements d'aires collectives de jeux.
• n° 95-326 du 20/03/1995 relatif aux obligations de sécurité concernant la distribution de certains liquides à base de monoethyleneglycol.
• n° 95-937 du 24/08/1995 relatif à la prévention des risques résultant de l'usage des bicyclettes.
• n° 96-333 du 10/04/1996 relatif à la sécurité des consommateurs en ce qui concerne les échelles portables, escabeaux et marchepieds.
• n° 96-495 du 04/06/1996 fixant les exigences de sécurité auxquelles doivent répondre les cages de buts de football, de handball, de hokey sur gazon et en salle et les buts de basket-ball.
• n° 96-1136 du 18/12/1996 fixant les prescriptions de sécurité relatives aux aires collectives de jeux.
• n° 96-1133 du 24/12/1996 relatif à l'interdiction de l'amiante, pris en application du Code du travail et du Code de la consommation.
• n° 97-617 du 30/05/1997 relatif à la vente et à la mise à disposition du public de certains appareils de bronzage utilisant des rayonnements ultraviolets.

IV. Contact points

• Administrations locales compétentes Direction Départementale de la Concurrence, de la Consommation et de la Répression des Fraudes (DDCCRF) 
• Direction des Services Vétérinaires (DSV) 
• Direction Départementale des Affaires Sanitaires et Sociales (DDASS) 
• Direction Régionale de l'Industrie, de la Recherche et de l'Environnement (DRIRE) 
• Inspection Régionale de la Pharmacie

Note: This Citizens First Factsheet is intended to provide guidance on EU law for information purposes only. It has been prepared by the European Commission with the help of national authorities and contains information on the national implementation of EU law. You are advised that the texts of Community legal instruments should be relied upon in case of doubt concerning the extent of a right or obligation arising from EU law.