Council progress report on Consumer Credit

06 December 2006

On its latest meeting in Brussels the Council discussed a progress report on the Consumer Credit Directive. Member States have requested additional modifications aimed at meeting their national constraints. Several delegations maintained a substantial reservation on the added value of the text for their national consumer credit legislation and/or the Community acquis. Some of them also questioned the usefulness of continuing the negotiations in the absence of an impact assessment.

The Commission maintains its position on the necessity to provide for more detailed harmonised rules and to limit the degree of flexibility on issues which were previously covered by the mutual recognition clause.

Divergences mainly concern :

the scope of the proposal;

the scope and the nature of information to be given to the consumer at each stage leading to the conclusion of the consumer credit agreement;

the right of withdrawal and its relationship to early repayment, especially for linked credit agreements;

the creditor’s possible right to compensation in case of early repayment;

the definition of the annual percentage of rate of charge (APR), in particular the inclusion of taxes, and the method for its calculation.

Progress report
Council Press release

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