Call for proposals for action grants and action grants of exceptional utility for co-operation between national authorities responsible for the enforcement of consumer protection law
Programme Category
Programme Name
Programme Description
The Single Market Programme (SMP) covers the single market, competitiveness of enterprises, including small and medium-sized enterprises, the area of plants, animals, food and feed, and European statistics. Specifically, the programme brings together aspects in order to streamline, exploit synergies and provide a better flexible, transparent, simplified and agile framework to finance activities aiming at a well-functioning sustainable internal market.
Identifier Code
Call
Summary
This Call aims at supporting the activities of national authorities and other relevant bodies notified under the Consumer Protection Cooperation (CPC) Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2017/2394) to tackle breaches of the law.
Detailed Call Description
The action grants defined on the basis of the call for proposals can support a wide range of activities, such as:
- Implementation of the minimum investigation and enforcement powers, in particular activities linked to the exchange of good practices as regards the power to carry out mystery shopping (under a cover ID), to remove content or to restrict access to an online interface, or to trace financial and data flows.
- staff training, including activities for knowledge acquisition and sharing on enforcement techniques to prepare for the deployment of innovative e-tools to strengthen national authorities’ capacity to tackle illegal online commercial practices by the Commission.
- creation of online interfaces, e-enforcement and monitoring tools that complement the deployment of innovative e-tools to strengthen national authorities’ capacity to tackle illegal online commercial practices.
- legal studies regarding the application of consumer law provisions in a specific context, notably with regard to new business models in the green or digital economy,
- sector inquiries of specific business sectors and surveys of retailers on practices that may infringe EU consumer law,
- networking tools, including workshops, for example to facilitate the cooperation with other public authorities within Member States and other enforcement capacities, including purchase of equipment and hard- or software for digital investigations and for product testing
Exceptional utility action grants defined on the basis of the call for proposals can cover the above-mentioned activities and should involve at least three Member States or should concern infringements which cause or are likely to cause harm in two or more Member States.
Call Total Budget
Financing percentage by EU or other bodies / Level of Subsidy or Loan
The maximum level for all grants to national authorities is 50% of eligible costs.
Actions of exceptional utility the co-financing rate shall be increased to 70 % of the eligible costs.
Thematic Categories
- Small-Medium Enterprises and Competitiveness
Eligibility for Participation
- Large Enterprises
- NGOs
- Non Profit Organisations
- Private Bodies
- Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)
- State-owned Enterprises
Eligibility For Participation Notes
In order to be eligible, the applicants (beneficiaries and affiliated entities) must be on the date of the submission of the proposal, one of the following entities (notified to the Commission in accordance with Article 8 of Regulation (EU) 2017/2394):
- competent authorities,
- single liaison offices,
- designated bodies,
- entities issuing external alerts under Article 27 (1) of the Regulation (EU) 2017/2394;
(Further details look p. 10 of the Call document)
Call Opening Date
Call Closing Date
EU Contact Point
For individual questions on the Portal Submission System, please contact the IT Helpdesk:
Non-IT related questions should be sent to the following email address:
EISMEA-SMPCOSME-ENQUIRIES@ec.europa.eu.
(Publish Date: 24/06/2021, for internal use only)