•  ECJ "Alpine Investments" from 10.05.1995, C-384/93: Prohibition of cold calling by telephone for financial services
 
The ECJ decided that “it is a restriction on freedom to provide services for a Member State to prohibit financial intermediaries established there from contacting potential clients in another Member State by telephone without their prior consent to offer them services linked to investment in commodities futures, but the restriction is justified by the imperative reason of public interest consisting in maintaining the good reputation of the national financial sector. The smooth operation of financial markets is largely contingent on the confidence they inspire in investors, which depends in particular on the existence of professional regulations serving to ensure the competence and trustworthiness of financial intermediaries. By protecting investors from a method of canvassing which generally catches them unawares, the prohibition of cold calling on a market as speculative as that in commodities futures seeks to secure the integrity of the national financial sector.
Since the Member State from which the unsolicited telephone call is made is best placed to regulate the canvassing of potential clients who are in another Member State, it cannot be complained that the former Member State does not leave that task to the Member State of the recipient. Moreover, the restriction at issue cannot be considered excessive since it is limited to the sector in which abuses have been found and to only one of the possible methods of approaching clients”. 

•  ECJ "Heininger I" from 13.12.2001, C-481/99: Secured-credit agreement and application of the doorstep sale rules

In this case there was a conflict between Miss and Mr Heininger and Bayerische Hypo- und Vereinsbank AG about the right to cancel a secured-credit agreement
The ECJ decided that the Council Directive 85/577/EEC of 20 December 1985 to protect the consumer in respect of contracts negotiated away from business premises is to be interpreted as applying to a secured-credit agreement such as that in point in the main proceedings, with the result that the right of cancellation provided for in Article 5 of that directive is available to a consumer who has entered into a contract of that type in one of the cases specified in Article 1.
Futhermore the ECJ ruled that Directive 85/577 precludes the national legislature from imposing a time-limit of one year from the conclusion of the contract within which the right of cancellation provided for in Article 5 of that directive may be exercised, where the consumer has not received the information specified in Article 4.

• ECJ " Travel vac" from 22 april 1999, C-423/97: Acquisition of a right to use immoveable property on a time-share basis and application of the doorstep sale rules

In this cas the ECJ rules:

1. Council Directive 85/577/EEC of 20 December 1985 to protect the consumer in respect of contracts negotiated away from business premises applies to a contract relating to the acquisition of a right to use immoveable property on a time-share basis and to the provision of services whose value is higher than that of the right to use the immoveable property.

2. A contract concluded in a situation in which a trader has invited a consumer to go in person to a specified place at a certain distance from the place where the consumer lives and which is different from the premises where the trader usually carries on his business and is not clearly identified as premises for sales to the public, in order to present to him the products and services he is offering, must be considered to have been concluded during an excursion organised by the trader away from his business premises within the meaning of Directive 85/577.

3. The consumer can exercise his right of renunciation under Article 5(1) of Directive 85/577 where the contract has been concluded in circumstances such as those described in Article 1 of that directive, without there being any need to prove that the consumer was influenced or manipulated by the trader.

4. Directive 85/577 does not preclude a Member State from adopting rules providing that the notice of renunciation provided for by Article 5(1) of the directive is not subject to any condition as to form.

5. Directive 85/577 precludes the inclusion in a contract of a clause imposing payment by the consumer of a lump sum for damage caused to the trader for the sole reason that the consumer has exercised his right of renunciation. 

• ECJ "Crailsheimer-Volksbank" from 25.10.2005, C-229/04: Loan agreement linked to property purchase concluded in a doorstep‑selling situation and the requirement according to german law to pay back the loan proceeds to the lender in case of cancelling

The reference was made in proceedings brought by Crailsheimer Volksbank eG (‘the Bank’) against some consumers (‘the borrowers’) concerning the cancellation, under the applicable national law on doorstep selling, of the credit agreements concluded between the borrowers and the Bank to finance the purchase of immovable property. The ECJ confirmed that the directive 85/577/EEC about doorstep-selling is also applicable to credit agreements. The ECJ settled that when a third party intervenes in the name of or on behalf of a trader in the negotiation or conclusion of a contract, the application of the Directive cannot be made subject to the condition that the trader was or should have been aware that the contract was concluded in a doorstep selling situation as referred to in Article 1 of the Directive. The knowledge of the bank about the doorstep-selling is indifferent.
However the ECJ decides that the directive does not preclude requirement that a consumer who has exercised his right of cancelation under the Directive must pay back the loan proceeds to the lender, even though according to the scheme drawn up for the investment the loan serves solely to finance the purchase of the immovable property and is paid directly to the vendor thereof; a requirement that the amount of the loan must be paid back immediately; national legislation which provides for an obligation on the consumer, in the event of cancellation of a secured credit agreement, not only to repay the amounts received under the agreement but also to pay to the lender interest at the market rate.