Jurisdiction(s):
European Union

CJEU AG: French €3 book-delivery fee governed by EU Services Directive; potentially justified if proportionate and necessary; delivery a separate service; Amazon challenge pending (C‑366/24)

Published on: 04 July 2025

Published by an LexisNexis EU Law expert

Legal News

Article summary

Amazon has contested the rule, which covers orders below €35, petitioning the EU’s top court in April 2025 to overturn it and to have the measure annulled in its entirety. According to the opinion, a national measure designed to foster cultural diversity falls within the EU Services Directive and can be justified only if the classic Article 16 criteria—most notably proportionality—are satisfied and properly evidenced. In short, pursuing cultural diversity does not, by itself, remove a law from the Directive’s scope or exclude it from review.

Although, at a Court of Justice of the EU hearing in Luxembourg in April 2025, the French government maintained that the charge is permitted under EU rules that allow limits to defend cultural diversity, the opinion nevertheless insists the measure must still clear the Services Directive’s proportionality and necessity hurdles in a convincing manner. Put differently, France has to prove the fee is suitable, appropriate, and strictly required to comply with EU law before it can stand under EU law. Szpunar added there is no need to resort to wider EU treaty provisions—such as those on...

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