In a ruling dated January 19, 2017, the Federal Court of Justice once again commented on the amount in dispute for warnings regarding invalid general terms and conditions (case no.: III ZR 296/16). According to the German Act on Injunctions for Consumer Rights and Other Infringements (UKlaG), the amount in dispute is generally to be set at EUR 2,500 per clause.
Complaint is governed by the UKlaG
According to the BGH, the complaint in such proceedings under the UKlaG is based on the public interest in the omission of the disputed unlawful clause. The Court seeks to protect consumer protection associations in the exercise of their power to exempt legal transactions from invalid general terms and conditions. Therefore, the economic significance of such clauses should no longer play a decisive role in the assessment of the complaint.
2,500 euros per challenged clause
This requirement should not only apply to the complaint of a consumer protection association. It also applies to the complaint of the user who loses the injunction proceedings. For the sake of standardization, the BGH sets the value at 2,500 euros per challenged clause of the general terms and conditions.
No real standard dispute values – value can be increased
However, the BGH also emphasized that this value could be increased in other cases. This is because competition law does not have any real standard dispute values. As the BGH merely states in its reasoning that the value can also be set higher, this certainly allows the conclusion that a value of EUR 2,500 is the lower limit of the value in such matters.
It is not excluded from the outset that the outstanding economic significance of a clause for the affected public may exceptionally be taken into account in individual cases by calculating a higher value if the decision on the validity of a certain clause is of essential importance not only for its user and the contractual partners, but for the entire industry. This may be the case, for example, if extremely controversial generalizable legal questions of great economic significance are at stake, the answer to which is already the subject of numerous disputes with controversial results.
In the case of clauses with outstanding economic significance, the value of the complaint may well be higher. This could be the case, for example, if the clause is not only of great importance for the user and the contractual partners, but for the entire industry.
As an example, the court cites cases in which extremely controversial generalizable legal questions with major economic implications are answered, which have previously been the subject of controversial and extensive debate.