EDF CSPE charges unlawful

Fairport · 1 May 2014 at 1:01PM

This is one for Expats living in France and receiving their electricity bills from EDF (a total monopoly situation in France).

On 19th December 2013, The European Union Court Of Justice deemed that an EDF 'tax', known as the Contribution Au Service Public de l'Ectricite (CSPE), was deemed unlawful and that EDF customers may have the right to contact the Commision de Regulation de l'Energie in Paris, demanding the reimbursement of the CSPE tax payments for the previous 24 months. As this particular tax accounts for around 10% of most peoples bills, the amounts claimed can be quite substantial.

My reason for writing to Martin & his team is to ask why there is a 24 month backdate period limit being stipulated? We arrived in France back in October 2005, and I've checked our EDF bills that far back.... and low & behold the same CSPE tax has always existed, and they even add TVA (vat) to the amount just to make things worse!

Is there an accepted maximum backdate period whereby the service provider, in this case EDF, cannot be held further responsible, or could it be possible claim for 3 or even 5 years of unlawful charges rather than the 24 months presently being suggested/recommended?

This is a general question and I am not looking for a specific answer from you to substantiate a greater claim, just to get an idea of service providers obligations in general where they have implemented charges unlawfully.

Many thanks MSE. Stirling work as ever! Kind regards, Fairport x

yasmup · 1 May 2014 at 1:14PM

Fairport wrote: »

This is one for Expats living in France and receiving their electricity bills from EDF (a total monopoly situation in France).

On 19th December 2013, The European Union Court Of Justice deemed that an EDF 'tax', known as the Contribution Au Service Public de l'Ectricite (CSPE), was deemed unlawful and that EDF customers may have the right to contact the Commision de Regulation de l'Energie in Paris, demanding the reimbursement of the CSPE tax payments for the previous 24 months. As this particular tax accounts for around 10% of most peoples bills, the amounts claimed can be quite substantial.

My reason for writing to Martin & his team is to ask why there is a 24 month backdate period limit being stipulated? We arrived in France back in October 2005, and I've checked our EDF bills that far back.... and low & behold the same CSPE tax has always existed, and they even add TVA (vat) to the amount just to make things worse!

Is there an accepted maximum backdate period whereby the service provider, in this case EDF, cannot be held further responsible, or could it be possible claim for 3 or even 5 years of unlawful charges rather than the 24 months presently being suggested/recommended?

This is a general question and I am not looking for a specific answer from you to substantiate a greater claim, just to get an idea of service providers obligations in general where they have implemented charges unlawfully.

Many thanks MSE. Stirling work as ever! Kind regards, Fairport x

As this site is designed for UK residents, I doubt you will get any response from Martin or his team (not that posting on the forum usually does get any response anyway)

You should probably seek legal advice in the appropriate land if you think what they are doing is wrong. The internet is not the place to seek legal advice, and especially not so from a UK site about foreign laws.