law://eu/cjeu/1982/c-283-82/hd_1_1_1@2026-11-12The repayment or remission of import or export duties is governed by Council Regulation (EEC) No 1430/79 of 2 July 1979 (Official Journal 1979, L 175, p. 1).In particular, Articles 3 and 4 provide for the repayment or remission of import duties where “the competent authorities are satisfied that the amount of such duties entered in the accounts relates to goods which were entered in error for free circulation instead of being placed under another customs regime”.Article 13 of the same regulation provides that import duties may be repaid or remitted in situations resulting from special circumstances in which no negligence or deception may be attributed to the person concerned. The provisions for the implementation of that article are laid down in Commission Regulation (EEC) No 1575/80 of 20 June 1980 (Official Journal 1980, L 161, p. 13). If the national authority considers that the application submitted by the person concerned is supported by sufficient evidence, it submits the case to the Commission, which takes a decision after consulting a group of experts composed of representatives of all the Member States meeting within the framework of the Committee on Duty-Free Arrangements.In October 1981 the applicant entered for free circulation five consignments of drawing paper from Switzerland and paid customs duties on them. The paper had been purchased in order to fulfil an order which exceeded the applicant's production capacity. The paper was intended for export to Japan and the only operation carried out by the applicant was to affix new labels to the consignments and then to load them immediately into containers which were shipped to Yokohama.According to the applicant, the consignments of paper were entered for free circulation as a result of an error attributable to the very short period between the arrival of the goods and their reshipment, the unusual nature of the operation and lack of experience on the part of the applicant's employee who was responsible for dealing with the customs formalities. The error was noticed only after the goods had been dispatched, and an application for repayment of the duty was made on 9 November 1981.The German customs authorities refused the applicant the benefit of Articles 3 and 4 of Regulation No 1430/79, stating that the duty could not be repaid in that particular case because the goods had not been exported under customs supervision. The applicant therefore asked for Article 13 of the regulation to be applied and that request was forwarded to the Commission, which gave its decision on the basis of the opinion of the experts meeting within the Committee on Duty-Free Arrangements. At its meeting of 19 May 1982 the majority of the delegates considered that there were no grounds for granting the applicant's application of 9 November 1981. In their opinion, the case submitted must be examined in the light of the provisions of Articles 3 and 4, which precluded the application of Article 13. The Commission notified its negative decision to the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany on 9 July 1982.By an application received at the Court Registiy on 25 October 1982, the applicant brought an action under Article 173 of the EEC Treaty for a declaration that that decision was void.The written procedure followed the normal course.Upon hearing the report of the Judge-Rapporteur and the views of the Advocate General, the Court decided to open the oral procedure without any preparatory inquiry and assigned the case to the Third Chamber.
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