FS v Chief Appeals Officer and Others.

• Jurisdiction: European Union
• ECLI: ECLI:EU:C:2022:737
• Date: 29 September 2022
• Docket Number: C-3/21
• Celex Number: 62021CJ0003
• Court: Court of Justice (European Union)
• Procedure Type: Reference for a preliminary ruling

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT (Seventh Chamber)

29 September 2022 (*)

(Reference for a preliminary ruling – Social security for migrant workers – Regulation (EC) No 883/2004 – Coordination of social security systems – Family benefits – Back payment – Relocation of the beneficiary to another Member State – Article 81 – Concept of ‘claim’ – Article 76(4) – Duty of mutual information and cooperation – Non-compliance – 12-month limitation period – Principle of effectiveness)

In Case C‑3/21,

REQUEST for a preliminary ruling under Article 267 TFEU from the High Court (Ireland), made by decision of 30 November 2020, received at the Court on 4 January 2021, in the proceedings

FS

v

The Chief Appeals Officer,

The Social Welfare Appeals Office,

The Minister for Employment Affairs,

The Minister for Social Protection,

THE COURT (Seventh Chamber),

composed of J. Passer, President of the Chamber, F. Biltgen (Rapporteur) and N. Wahl, Judges,

Advocate General: P. Pikamäe,

Registrar: A. Calot Escobar,

having regard to the written procedure,

after considering the observations submitted on behalf of:

– FS, by S. Kirwan, Solicitor, A. McMahon, Barrister-at-Law, and D. Shortall, Senior Counsel,

– The Chief Appeals Officer, The Social Welfare Appeals Office, The Minister for Employment Affairs and The Minister for Social Protection, by M. Browne, A. Joyce, J. Quaney, acting as Agents, and by K. Binchy, Barrister, and C. Donnelly, Senior Counsel,

– the Czech Government, by J. Pavliš, M. Smolek and J. Vláčil, acting as Agents,

– the European Commission, by B.‑R. Killmann and D. Martin, acting as Agents,

having decided, after hearing the Advocate General, to proceed to judgment without an Opinion,

gives the following

Judgment

1 This request for a preliminary ruling concerns the interpretation of Article 76(4) and Article 81 of Regulation (EC) No 883/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the coordination of social security systems (OJ 2004 L 166, p. 1, and corrigendum OJ 2004 L 200, p. 1).

2 The request has been made in proceedings between the applicant in the main proceedings, FS, and the Chief Appeals Officer (Ireland), the Social Welfare Appeals Office (Ireland), the Minister for Employment Affairs and the Minister for Social Protection concerning the rejection of a claim for back payment of child benefit made by FS.

Legal context

European Union law

3 Article 76 of Regulation No 883/2004, entitled ‘Cooperation’, provides in paragraphs 4 and 5:

‘4. The institutions and persons covered by this Regulation shall have a duty of mutual information and cooperation to ensure the correct implementation of this Regulation.

The institutions, in accordance with the principle of good administration, shall respond to all queries within a reasonable period of time and shall in this connection provide the persons concerned with any information required for exercising the rights conferred on them by this Regulation.

The persons concerned must inform the institutions of the competent Member State and of the Member State of residence as soon as possible of any change in their personal or family situation which affects their right to benefits under this Regulation.

5. Failure to respect the obligation of information referred to in the third subparagraph of paragraph 4 may result in the application of proportionate measures in accordance with national law. Nevertheless, these measures shall be equivalent to those applicable to similar situations under domestic law and shall not make it impossible or excessively difficult in practice for claimants to exercise the rights conferred on them by this Regulation.’

4 Article 81 of that regulation, entitled ‘Claims, declarations or appeals’, provides:

‘Any claim, declaration or appeal which should have been submitted, in application of the legislation of one Member State, within a specified period to an authority, institution or tribunal of that Member State shall be admissible if it is submitted within the same period to a corresponding authority, institution or tribunal of another Member State. In such a case the authority, institution or tribunal receiving the claim, declaration or appeal shall forward it without delay to the competent authority, institution or tribunal of the former Member State either directly or through the competent authorities of the Member States concerned. The date on which such claims, declarations or appeals were submitted to the authority, institution or tribunal of the second Member State shall be considered as the date of their submission to the competent authority, institution or tribunal.’

Irish law

5 Section 220 of the Social Welfare Consolidation Act 2005 of 27 November 2005, in the version applicable to the dispute in the main proceedings (‘the 2005 Act’), provides that a person with whom a qualified child normally resides is to be qualified for child benefit in respect of that child and is referred to as ‘a qualified person’.

6 Section 241(1) of that law requires that it is to be a condition of any person’s right to any benefit that he or she makes a claim for that benefit in the prescribed manner.

7 Under Article 182(k) of the Social Welfare (Consolidated Claims, Payment and Control) Regulations 2007 (S.I. No 142 of 2007) – Prescribed time for making claim, in the version applicable to the dispute in the main proceedings, in respect of claims for child benefit, the prescribed period is to be 12 months from the day on which, apart from satisfying the conditions of making a claim, the claimant becomes a qualified person within the meaning of section 220 of the 2005 Act.

8 Section 241(4) of the 2005 Act states, in essence, that a person who fails to make a claim for child benefit within the prescribed time is to be disqualified from seeking any backdating of payment to before the date on which the claim is made, unless a deciding officer or appeals officer is satisfied that there was good cause for delay in making the claim, in which case, child benefit is to be payable from the first day of the month following that in which the claimant became a qualified person within the meaning of section 220 of that law.

9 Section 301 of the same law provides, inter alia, that a deciding officer may at any time revise any decision of a deciding officer, where there has been any relevant change of circumstances since the decision was given.

The dispute in the main proceedings and the questions referred for a preliminary ruling

10 The applicant in the main proceedings, a Romanian national, married in 2012 in Romania, where she gave birth to a child in December 2015.

11 She made a claim for child benefit in that Member State, which was granted to her from December 2015 or January 2016.

12 In October 2016, the husband of the applicant in the main proceedings moved to Ireland to work there as a health care assistant. He did not make a claim for child benefit in that Member State. When, at the end of 2016, the applicant in the main proceedings and their child joined him in Ireland, she also did not submit a claim to that effect in Ireland, but continued to receive Romanian child benefit.

13 On 10 January 2018, the applicant in the main proceedings made a claim to the...