Case C-152/10
Unomedical A/S
v
Skatteministeriet
(Reference for a preliminary ruling from the Højesteret)
(Common Customs Tariff – Tariff classification – Combined Nomenclature – Plastic dialysis drainage bags intended exclusively for use with dialysers (artificial kidneys) – Plastic urine drainage bags intended exclusively for use with catheters – Headings 9018 and 3926 – ‘Parts’ and ‘accessories’ – Other articles of plastics)
Summary of the Judgment
1.Common Customs Tariff – Tariff headings – Plastic dialysis drainage bag intended exclusively for use with a dialyser (artificial kidney) – Plastic urine drainage bag intended exclusively for use with a catheter
(Council Regulation No 2658/87, Annex I)
2.Common Customs Tariff – Tariff headings – Interpretation – Use of the classification opinions of the Customs Code Committee and the World Customs Organisation
1.The Combined Nomenclature, set out in Annex I to Regulation No 2658/87 on the tariff and statistical nomenclature and on the Common Customs Tariff (‘CN’), must be interpreted as meaning that a dialysis drainage bag, manufactured from plastic, which is specially designed for, and can be used only with, a dialyser (artificial kidney), had, between May 2001 and December 2003, to be classified under subheading 39269099 of the CN as ‘plastics and articles thereof’ and that a urine drainage bag, manufactured from plastic, which is specially designed for, and therefore can be used only in connection with, a catheter had, during the same period, to be classified under subheading 39269099 of the CN as ‘plastics and articles thereof’.
Those products cannot be classified either as ‘parts’ or as ‘accessories’ or a catheter (subheading 9018 39 00) or a dialyser (artificial kidney) (subheading 9018 90 30) respectively, inasmuch as neither the urine drainage bag for catheters nor the drainage bag for dialysers is indispensable for the functioning of those instruments or apparatus, nor do they enable the instruments and apparatus to be adapted for a particular operation, or increase their range of operations, or enable them to perform a particular service connected with their main function.
(see paras 35-36, 38, 43, operative part)
2.The interpretative opinions of the Customs Code Committee and the Committee of the World Customs Organisation respectively, in the CN and the Harmonised Commodity Description and Coding System, which have not led to the adoption of a regulation, may validly be used in legal relationships created and established before those opinions were adopted.
(see para. 42)