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The Services Directive – The right to buy services from other countries within the EU
Tjänstedirektivet – att köpa tjänster i andra länder inom EU - Engelska
In order to facilitate cross-border trade with services, the EU Member States have agreed on the rules and conditions that are to apply. They are gathered in the Services Directive.
Translated page: This text has been translated from Swedish. The text and appearance of the page may look different from the original page.
Overview of the Services Directive
Companies within the EU are required to offer equivalent conditions to customers from different countries if they sell services. There may be exceptions if they are justified by objective reasons.
The Services Directive only covers services provided for economic compensation. A number of services are excluded, such as transport services and financial services.
You can contact ECC Sweden if you have questions about the Services Directive
What does the Services Directive mean for you as a consumer?
The Member States in the EU may not set requirements that restrict the possibility of purchasing services from companies in other countries, or that discriminate between customers due to nationality or place of residence.
Customers shall be treated equally
Companies are required to offer equivalent conditions to customers from different countries. Customers should not be treated differently based on where they live or be denied the purchase of a service available to the public in another EU country. An example of prohibited treatment is if you rent a car online in another EU country and have to pay a higher rental fee just because you do not live in the country where the car is rented.
When different terms for different countries can be OK
The actual costs being higher due to distance or technical details in connection with the service being performed.
There being different market conditions between different countries, such as seasonally influenced demand or different holiday periods.
Distribution agreements between, for example, manufacturers and resellers that prevent companies from selling services to countries other than their own.
Extra risks linked to doing business in a country other than where the company has its registered offices, such as difficulties securing the payment.
Intellectual property rights. It may, for example, concern a company that cannot sell e-books or music to customers in other countries due to copyright regulations.
A number of services are exempt from the Directive’s area of application. A few examples are:
Transport services
Services offered by staffing agencies
Financial services, such as banking and credit services, insurance, pension savings, securities and investment funds, as well as investment advice, payments and leasing
Private security services
Some gambling services/gaming operations, such as lotteries, casino games and betting
Audiovisual services, such as cinemas and radio broadcasts
Electronic communications services
Health and medical care services
The Services Directive also does not affect rules that guarantee consumers protection according to the legislation in their home countries
In order to make it easier for buyers of services, the Services Directive includes provisions intended to provide good information about the companies that sell the services. This also provides the possibility of comparing services and thereby creating equal terms for businesses from different countries.
Examples of the kind of basic information that service providers must provide information on before an agreement is reached:
Name and legal form
Contact information, such as phone number and email address
Registration information
General conditions
What the service mainly consists of
Price (if it is set in advance)
Insurance and warranties
If permits are required to conduct the operations, there must also be information on the authority that granted the permits or to relevant contact points.
There is also information that the company needs to provide if the buyer of the service requests it. Among other things, this concerns information about:
- Calculation method for the price (if it is not possible to determine in advance)
- Information on the provider’s operations and partnerships, as well as information on what steps have been taken to avoid conflicts of interest
- Information on any codes of conduct and possibilities for dispute resolution in the event of membership with a professional or industry organisation.
The companies that sell services must respond to complaints as soon as possible, and do their best to resolve disputes quickly and in a good manner. The companies must also provide contact information to complaint boards, to which consumers in other Member States can also turn.
If you have questions regarding the Services Directive, you can turn to your national contact point for the Services Directive. There is a contact point are in every EU country, as well as Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and the UK. In Sweden, there are two contact points, one for consumers and one for companies. The purpose of the contact points is to make it easier for companies and consumers to offer and buy services in the internal market and ensure the free mobility of services.
Contact point for consumers – ECC Sweden
ECC Sweden has the assignment of informing consumers when purchasing services from other EU countries. ECC Sweden, which can provide information on:
Consumer rights in purchases of services in the EU, Norway and Iceland
Possibilities of legal review of disputes
Email: konsumenteuropa@konsumentverket.se
It does not cost anything to contact us. You can contact us in Swedish or English. We endeavor to answer your question as soon as possible and within three working days. If your question requires investigation and if we need to gather information from other authorities, it may take longer, however, before we can respond. In these cases, we strive to respond to you within 14 days. If in exceptional cases we cannot live up to this, we will let you know.
The National Board of Trade is a Swedish government agency for international trade, the EU internal market and trade policy. The National Board of Trade assists companies with information on regulations relating to services.
If a company violates the provisions in the Services Directive, you as a consumer can file a supervisory report to the Swedish Consumer Agency. This may, for example, involve the company:
Discriminating customers based on nationality or place of residence
Not providing the information they are obliged to provide
The content is presented in collaboration with ECC Sweden, which is part of the ECC network and the Swedish Consumer Agency's information service. ECC Sweden is part-financed by the European Union.
The content of this website represents the views of the author only and it is his/her sole responsibility; it cannot be considered to reflect the views of the European Commission and/or the European Innovation Council and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Executive Agency (EISMEA) or any other body of the European Union. The European Commission and the Agency do not accept any responsibility for use that may be made of the information it contains.
This website is part of an EU quality Network
Your Europe is an EU website that will help you do things in other European countries - without hassle or unnecessary bureaucracy. Information on Your Europe is provided by the relevant departments of the European Commission and complemented by content provided by the authorities in every country it covers.
