Global Competition Law is primarly a practitioner's guide presenting the most salient aspects of the major competition laws country by country, giving an overview of their structure and most charasteristic elements.
Global Competition Law also provides insight into possible future developments in the field.

Global Competition Law

The FAS may start an investigation or proceedings on its own initiative or on receiving information from other State agencies, the media or third parties. To trigger an investigation, a third party (for example, a competitor, buyer or consumer) may file a complaint with the FAS for a violation of the LPC. The procedure for investigating a case is the same whether the FAS initiated proceedings on i …

Complaints and investigations

The FAS may start an investigation or proceedings on its own initiative or on receiving information from other State agencies, the media or third parties. To trigger an investigation, a third party (for example, a competitor, buyer or consumer) may file a complaint with the FAS for a violation of the LPC. The procedure for investigating a case is the same whether the FAS initiated proceedings on its own initiative or following a third party complaint. The FAS must review any complaint and/ or supporting materials within one month of their submission and decide whether to initiate an action in relation to an alleged violation of the LPC.

When exercising control over compliance with the LPC, the FAS has a wide range of powers. It can, for example, conduct scheduled and unscheduled inspections (dawn raids) of undertakings, request and obtain all documents, explanations and information including commercial or trade secrets and other privileged information, gain access to the undertakings' premises.

Undertakings may submit drafts of certain types of agreements to the FAS for a compliance review with the LPC. This notification process is broadly similar to that for mergers.

The Commission established by the FAS must adopt a decision within three months, with a possible extension to six months, and may issue an injunction to eliminate breaches or perform other corrective actions.

The LPC is silent on the possibility of reaching a settlement without issuing an infringement decision during a FAS review of an alleged breach of competition law. However, the FAS can terminate proceedings in relation to a violation if the party responsible for the violation voluntarily eliminates the violation and rectifies its consequences.

The Third Antimonopoly Package (TAP) of December 2011 introduced two new forms of control by the FAS: a preventive notice and a warning. A preventive notice is issued where no prohibited behavior has occurred yet but there is a statement made by a representative of the entity that it is planning to undertake a certain behavior which, in the view of the FAS, may lead to an antitrust violation. A warning is issued in case of an existing behavior that may lead to an antitrust violation. The TAP only allowed the use of warnings for two types of abuse of dominance. The Fourth Antimonopoly Package (FAP) of October 2015 extended the list of infringements which may lead to an FAS warning. Since January 2016, a warning may be sent when a dominant undertaking imposes disadvantageous contractual terms on a partner or terms unrelated to the subject of agreement, refuses without any economic or technological justification to enter into a contract with an individual purchaser, sets different prices for the same products without economic or technological justification or imposes discriminatory conditions. Acts of unfair competition may also be the subject of a warning. As previously, an administrative proceeding may be initiated by the FAS only if the entity did not react and there remain signs of an antitrust violation.

Federal Law No 33-FZ of 1 March 2020, designed to encourage the setting-up of voluntary competition compliance programs came into force on 12 March 2020. It details the minimal requirements that the program must satisfy and allows the undertakings to submit their program to the FAS for approval. The existence of a compliance program may eventually be taken into account when the FAS determines the amount of the fine.

Proceedings before the FAS

Under Section 25(7) of the LPC, where an officer of an economic entity has made a statement about proposed conduct that the FAS deems liable to be an infringement of the LPC and where there are no grounds to initiate and investigate a case on an antimonopoly violation, the FAS may send the entity a written warning on the prohibition of carrying out actions that can lead to 	a violation of the antimonopoly law. The decision to send a warning must be taken no later than ten days from the day when the FAS found out about the public statement made about the proposed conduct on a goods market. The warning must provide the conclusions about the grounds for sending a warning and the LPC provisions that may be violated by the economic entity.

Likewise, pursuant to Section 39(1), the FAS may issue a written warning to an economic entity in a dominant position to stop actions or omissions that show signs of violating the LPC, to eliminate the causes and conditions facilitating the emergence of the violation and to take measures towards eliminating the consequences of it. The warning must include the conclusions on the grounds for issuing the warning, the provisions of the LPC that were violated by the actions or omissions of the person to whom the warning is issued and the list of actions aimed at stopping the violation, eliminating the causes and conditions that facilitated it, eliminating the consequences of the violation and providing a reasonable period for their execution.

The warning must be considered as mandatory by the person to whom it is addressed within the period specified therein. The period for compliance with the warning must be no less than ten days. The FAS must be informed about the implementation of the warning within three days from the day of expiry of the period set for compliance. If the warning is complied with, an antimonopoly case is not initiated and the person having complied is not subject to administrative liability for violating the antimonopoly law due to its elimination. Conversely, if the warning is not complied with within the established period where there are signs of violating the LPC, the FAS makes a decision to initiate proceedings for infringement.

Global Competition Law

1200. Complaints and investigations

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Les notions juridiques connexes

1200. Complaints and investigations

Demandez un accès gratuit au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise

Les notions juridiques connexes

Demandez un accès gratuit
au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise