Curious: Energie Klagenfurt fees clients “ground and air charges”

The patron affiliation VSV has filed a class motion lawsuit in opposition to the Klagenfurt strength supplier on behalf of strength clients.

The VW diesel scandal has brought about the European Commission to introduce a new representative action policy so one can allow clients to extra effortlessly assert their rights in mass tort cases. The Austrian government need to have incorporated this new directive into national regulation or rules through closing Sunday.

“Only 3 EU member states have not yet implemented this directive, consisting of Austria. This is an indictment in phrases of purchasers,” says Daniela Holzinger Vogtenhuberchairman of Consumer Protection Association VSV. With a category motion lawsuit, regardless of the quantity of damage, you can highest court docket litigate “This manner you could attain same decisions for all Austrians,” says Holzinger-Vogtenhuber. According to the Consumer Protection Act, best the social partners (AK, WKÖ, LWK, ÖGB, VKI, Seniorenrat) have been authorized to bring such collective movements.

Legitimation

The SAAM hopes to be protected inside the group of plaintiffs under the new EU directive. “We additionally want to be legitimized to do so,” he says VSV Chief Legal Officer Peter Kolba. “The EU directive has the gain which you cannot handiest sue for an injunction, but also for remedial motion.” That method: With a new class motion lawsuit, for instance, a bank can be sentenced to having to pay returned immoderate expenses to clients. However, since the federal authorities is overdue in imposing the EU directive, the SAAM has released a legal assault. The association wants to realize whether it can carry a class movement lawsuit, even though the EU directive has not but been implemented in Austria.

For this check run, the VSV attorney Ulrich Salburg delivered a collective action towards Energie Klagenfurt on the capable local courtroom. In addition to the usual costs for energy charges, primary fees and grid costs, it also expenses electricity customers a charge for the usage of the ground and the air.

Where’s the overall performance?

“It fees clients an air and floor tax of six percentage of the assessment basis for the usage of community land and the airspace above it, wherein the strength cables run,” says lawyer Salburg.

“This municipal rate for the usage of the floor for underground cables underneath the municipal roads is in all likelihood to be pretty specific in Austria and is a special feature of Klagenfurt,” says the lawsuit. It is a fee without actual attention. The foundation for the charge is a Carinthian law.

“We are certain that this fee is illegal and unconstitutional,” says Salburg. Because in keeping with the lawyer, this “soil and air usage tax violates the Electricity Industry and Organization Act (ElWOG), that is a federal regulation that regulates the prices that community operators are allowed to charge.