Regulation (EC) No 550/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 March 2004 on the provision of air navigation services in the single European sky (the service provision Regulation) (Text with EEA relevance)

CHAPTER I

GENERAL

Article 1

Scope and objective

Article 2

Tasks of the national supervisory authorities

Article 3

Qualified entities

Article 4

Safety requirements

The Commission shall, in accordance with the regulatory procedure referred to in Article 5(3) of the framework Regulation, adopt implementing rules incorporating the relevant provisions of the Eurocontrol safety regulatory requirements (ESARRs) and subsequent amendments to those requirements falling within the scope of this Regulation, where necessary with appropriate adaptations.

CHAPTER II

RULES FOR THE PROVISION OF SERVICES

Article 6

Common requirements

Common requirements for the provision of air navigation services shall be established in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 5(3) of the framework Regulation. The common requirements shall include the following:

— technical and operational competence and suitability,

— systems and processes for safety and quality management,

— reporting systems,

— quality of services,

— financial strength,

— liability and insurance cover,

— ownership and organisational structure, including the prevention of conflicts of interest,

— human resources, including adequate staffing plans,

— security.

Article 7

Certification of air navigation service providers

Article 8

Designation of air traffic service providers

For the provision of cross-border services, Member States shall ensure that compliance with this Article and Article 10(3) is not prevented by their national legal system requiring that air traffic service providers providing services in the airspace under the responsibility of that Member State:

(a) be owned directly or through a majority holding by that Member State or its nationals;

(b) have their principal place of operation or registered office in the territory of that Member State; or

(c) use only facilities in that Member State.

Article 9

Designation of providers of meteorological services

Article 9a

Functional airspace blocks

Functional airspace blocks shall, in particular:

(a) be supported by a safety case;

(b) enable optimum use of airspace, taking into account air traffic flows;

(c) ensure consistency with the European route network established in accordance with Article 6 of the airspace Regulation;

(d) be justified by their overall added value, including optimal use of technical and human resources, on the basis of cost-benefit analyses;

(e) ensure a smooth and flexible transfer of responsibility for air traffic control between air traffic service units;

(f) ensure compatibility between the different airspace configurations, optimising, inter alia, the current flight information regions;

(g) comply with conditions stemming from regional agreements concluded within the ICAO;

(h) respect regional agreements in existence on the date of entry into force of this Regulation, in particular those involving European third countries; and

(i) facilitate consistency with Community-wide performance targets.

Article 9b

Functional airspace blocks system coordinator

Article 10

Relations between service providers

Article 11

Relations with military authorities

Member States shall, within the context of the common transport policy, take the necessary steps to ensure that written agreements between the competent civil and military authorities or equivalent legal arrangements are established or renewed in respect of the management of specific airspace blocks.

Article 12

Transparency of accounts

Article 13

Access to and protection of data

CHAPTER III

CHARGING SCHEMES

Article 14

General

In accordance with the requirements of Articles 15 and 16, the charging scheme for air navigation services shall contribute to greater transparency in the determination, imposition and enforcement of charges to airspace users and shall contribute to the cost efficiency of providing air navigation services and to efficiency of flights, while maintaining an optimum safety level. This scheme shall also be consistent with Article 15 of the 1944 Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation and with Eurocontrol's charging system for en-route charges.

Article 15

Principles

The following principles shall be applied when establishing the cost-base for charges:

(a) the cost to be shared among airspace users shall be the determined cost of providing air navigation services, including appropriate amounts for interest on capital investment and depreciation of assets, as well as the costs of maintenance, operation, management and administration. Determined costs shall be the costs determined by the Member State at national level or at the level of functional airspace blocks either at the beginning of the reference period for each calendar year of the reference period referred to in Article 11 of the framework Regulation, or during the reference period, following appropriate adjustments applying the alert mechanisms set out in Article 11 of the framework Regulation;

(b) the costs to be taken into account in this context shall be those assessed in relation to the facilities and services provided for and implemented under the ICAO Regional Air Navigation Plan, European Region. They may also include costs incurred by national supervisory authorities and/or qualified entities, as well as other costs incurred by the relevant Member State and service provider in relation to the provision of air navigation services. They shall not include the costs of penalties imposed by Member States according to Article 9 of the framework Regulation nor the costs of any corrective measures imposed by Member States according to Article 11 of the framework Regulation;

(c) in respect of the functional airspace blocks and as part of their respective framework agreements, Member States shall make reasonable efforts to agree on common principles for charging policy;

(d) the cost of different air navigation services shall be identified separately, as provided for in Article 12(3);

(e) cross-subsidy shall not be allowed between en-route services and terminal services. Costs that pertain to both terminal services and en-route services shall be allocated in a proportional way between en-route services and terminal services on the basis of a transparent methodology. Cross-subsidy shall be allowed between different air navigation services in either one of those two categories only when justified for objective reasons, subject to clear identification;

(f) transparency of the cost-base for charges shall be guaranteed. Implementing rules for the provision of information by the service providers shall be adopted in order to permit reviews of the provider's forecasts, actual costs and revenues. Information shall be regularly exchanged between the national supervisory authorities, service providers, airspace users, the Commission and Eurocontrol.

Member States shall comply with the following principles when setting charges in accordance with paragraph 2:

(a) charges shall be set for the availability of air navigation services under non-discriminatory conditions. When imposing charges on different airspace users for the use of the same service, no distinction shall be made in relation to the nationality or category of the user;

(b) exemption of certain users, especially light aircraft and State aircraft, may be permitted, provided that the cost of such exemption is not passed on to other users;

(c) charges shall be set per calendar year on the basis of the determined costs, or may be set under conditions established by Member States for determining the maximum level of the unit rate or of the revenue for each year over a period not exceeding five years;

(d) air navigation services may produce sufficient revenues to provide for a reasonable return on assets to contribute towards necessary capital improvements;

(e) charges shall reflect the cost of air navigation services and facilities made available to airspace users, taking into account the relative productive capacities of the different aircraft types concerned;

(f) charges shall encourage the safe, efficient, effective and sustainable provision of air navigation services with a view to achieving a high level of safety and cost-efficiency and meeting the performance targets and they shall stimulate integrated service provision, whilst reducing the environmental impact of aviation. To that end, and in relation to the national or functional airspace block performance plans, national supervisory authorities may set up mechanisms, including incentives consisting of financial advantages and disadvantages, to encourage air navigation service providers and/or airspace users to support improvements in the provision of air navigation services such as increased capacity, reduced delays and sustainable development, while maintaining an optimum safety level.

Article 15a

Common projects

Article 16

Review of compliance

CHAPTER IV

FINAL PROVISIONS

Article 17

Revision of Annexes

Measures, designed to amend non-essential elements of the Annexes in order to take into account technical or operational developments, shall be adopted in accordance with the regulatory procedure with scrutiny referred to in Article 5(4) of the framework Regulation.

On imperative grounds of urgency, the Commission may use the urgency procedure referred to in Article 5(5) of the framework Regulation.

Article 18

Confidentiality

Article 18a

Review

The Commission shall submit a study to the European Parliament and to the Council no later than 4 December 2012 evaluating the legal, safety, industrial, economic and social impacts of the application of market principles to the provision of communication, navigation, surveillance and aeronautical information services, compared to existing or alternative organisational principles and taking into account developments in the functional airspace blocks and in available technology.

Article 19

Entry into force

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

ANNEX I

The qualified entities must:

— be able to document extensive experience in assessing public and private entities in the air transport sectors, in particular air navigation service providers, and in other similar sectors in one or more of the fields covered by this Regulation,

— have comprehensive rules and regulations for the periodic survey of the abovementioned entities, published and continually upgraded and improved through research and development programmes,

— not be controlled by air navigation service providers, by airport management authorities or by others engaged commercially in the provision of air navigation services or in air transport services,

— be established with significant technical, managerial, support and research staff commensurate with the tasks to be carried out,

— be managed and administered in such a way as to ensure the confidentiality of information required by the administration,

— be prepared to provide relevant information to the national supervisory authority concerned,

— have defined and documented its policy and objectives for and commitment to quality and have ensured that this policy is understood, implemented and maintained at all levels in the organisation,

— have developed, implemented and maintained an effective internal quality system based on appropriate parts of internationally recognised quality standards and in compliance with EN 45004 (inspection bodies) and with EN 29001, as interpreted by the IACS Quality System Certification Scheme Requirements,

— be subject to certification of its quality system by an independent body of auditors recognised by the authorities of the Member State in which it is located.

ANNEX II

1.Certificates shall specify:

(a) the national supervisory authority issuing the certificate;

(b) the applicant (name and address);

(c) the services which are certified;

(d) a statement of the applicant's conformity with the common requirements, as defined in Article 6 of this Regulation;

(e) the date of issue and the period of validity of the certificate.

2.Additional conditions attached to certificates may, as appropriate, be related to:

(a) non-discriminatory access to services for airspace users and the required level of performance of such services, including safety and interoperability levels;

(b) the operational specifications for the particular services;

(c) the time by which the services should be provided;

(d) the various operating equipment to be used within the particular services;

(e) ring-fencing or restriction of operations of services other than those related to the provision of air navigation services;

(f) contracts, agreements or other arrangements between the service provider and a third party and which concern the service(s);

(g) provision of information reasonably required for the verification of compliance of the services with the common requirements, including plans, financial and operational data, and major changes in the type and/or scope of air navigation services provided;

(h) any other legal conditions which are not specific to air navigation services, such as conditions relating to the suspension or revocation of the certificate.