French Consumer Law is a comprehensive and comparative overview of French and EU law in this field, covering: advertising, unfair commercial practices, conditions for the validity of contracts, unfair terms, product conformity, latent defects, product safety.

French Consumer Law

Former Article L. 121-6 of the Consumer Code (current Article L. 132-2), in its original version, set out the penalties for the offense of misleading commercial practice by reference to Article L. 213-1 (current Article L. 441-1) of the same code relating to deception, for penalties applicable to natural persons, and Article L. 213-6 (current Article L. 454-5), for those applicable to legal entiti …

Fine

Former Article L. 121-6 of the Consumer Code (current Article L. 132-2), in its original version, set out the penalties for the offense of misleading commercial practice by reference to Article L. 213-1 (current Article L. 441-1) of the same code relating to deception, for penalties applicable to natural persons, and Article L. 213-6 (current Article L. 454-5), for those applicable to legal entities. Since its amendment by the Hamon Law of 17 March 2014, the text independently fixes the amount of fines at EUR 300,000 for natural persons and EUR 1.5 million for legal entities .

For the amount of the fine to be proportionate to the economic impact of the practice, former Article L. 121-6 provided that the maximum fine could be increased to 50% of the advertising expenditure or practice constituting the offense. In its version resulting from the Hamon Law, the text now re-codified in Article L. 132-2 provides that “the amount of the fine may be increased, in proportion to the benefits derived from the breach, to 10% of the average annual turnover, calculated on the last three annual turnovers known on the date of the offense, or 50% of the expenditure incurred for the advertising or practice constituting the offense”. The result is a real dilution effect since, for a misleading campaign estimated at EUR 6.4 million, although the professional was in a situation of recidivism, a court was able to impose a fine of EUR 300,000 . Another campaign estimated at EUR 8.1 million was sanctioned by a fine of EUR 500,000 , reduced to EUR 300,000 on appeal . Moreover, the Court of Cassation held that, in fixing the fine incurred by the co-perpetrators of the crime, the judge could take into account the total amount spent, and not the advertising expenditure incurred individually by each of them .  Article L. 132-2 was recently amended by Law No 2021-1104 of 22 August 2021 on combating climate change and strengthening resilience to its effects. It provides that the rate of the fine may be “increased to 80% in the case of misleading commercial practices mentioned in b and e of 2° of Article L. 121-2, when they are based on environmental claims”.  

Current Article L. 132-7 of the Consumer Code further specifies that in the event of refusal to communicate elements of justification or the advertising disseminated, the offender is liable to a fine of EUR 300,000. The same penalty applies in the event of non-compliance with decisions ordering the cessation of the commercial practice (Article L. 132-9) or non-execution within the time limit of corrective advertisements (Article L. 132-5). In addition, paragraph 2 of the current Article L. 132-6 allows the judge to issue an injunction to disclose the documents in question, together with a penalty payment of up to EUR 4,500 per day from the date he ordered for the production of these documents. 

 The amount of the fines has significantly increased since the Hamon Law. They were formerly EUR 37,500 and EUR 187,500 respectively. For applications, see Cass. crim., March 24, 2009, LawLex201200001094JBJ, imposing a fine of EUR 70,000 on a large retailer. Cf. Cass. crim., 20 November 2012, LawLex201300000020JBJ, overturning an appeal which had imposed a fine of EUR 200,000, exceeding the maximum of EUR 187,500.

 TGI Évry, 26 June 2007, LawLex200700001160JBJ.

 TGI Évry, 26 June 2007, LawLex200700001158JBJ. See also, the same day, judgment LawLex200700001162JBJ, imposing a fine of EUR 200,000 for a campaign estimated at EUR 5.3 million.

 CA Paris, 26 November 2008, LawLex200900000914JBJ.

 Cass. crim., 17 October 2000, LawLex200300003244JBJ.

French Consumer Law

193. Fine

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193. Fine

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Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

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