Useful details concerning competition law inquiries

A request for information, issued by the Designated Advisor to the Competition Council in the context of an investigation of anti-competitive practices, is not subject to an action for annulment before the Administrative Tribunal, as such a request is not qualified as an individual administrative decision. In a judgment of 28 May 2018, the Administrative Tribunal recalled that the decision emanating from an administrative authority, to be subject to a contentious appeal, must therefore constitute, for the intention of the authority issuing it, a real decision, that is to say a decision of a nature to produce by itself legal effects affecting the personal or patrimonial situation of the person claiming. A request for information does not meet these criteria.

Companies receiving requests for information from the Competition Council must respond to these requests, given that the Council may impose fines of up to 5 % of total revenue generated in the previous fiscal year when, intentionally or unintentionally, in response to a request for information, it provides inaccurate, incomplete or misleading information or does not provide information within the prescribed time. In addition, the Council may compel companies to respond to these requests under pain of penalty payments of up to 5% of the average daily turnover achieved during the last closed financial year, per day late in from the date fixed in its request for information.