Ecoservice has appealed the court’s recent findings in favour of PACTO, an Italian trade association and issues a cease and desist order against PACTO and its members.
In August, the Italian court in Macerata imposed a penalty of €5000 on Ecoservice di Santarelli Paolo for selling new cartridges as remanufactured in a legal action brought by PACTO, the Italian Association of Remanufacturers.
In an email to The Recycler, Ecoservice’s owner, Santarelli Paolo accuses PACTO and their members of “disseminating false and incorrect information about Ecoservice, based on a sentence of first grade issued by a nonprofessional judge” who “…has made grave mistakes.
Paulo also states that his company is not only a remanufacturer of printing consumables but offers also compatible consumables and that in Italy the word “compatible” is used for the “new and non-original” cartridges. His email goes on to say that PACTO is an Association representing 5 Italian companies that produce and sell printing consumables both remanufactured and compatible. These are companies in competition with Ecoservice and [according to Paolo] they have a marginal share in the Italian market of non-original printing consumables, and are all of smaller dimensions than Ecoservice in terms of turnover, number of employees, production and commercial spaces and that in the past, PACTO has moved other actions against Ecoservice, both in civil and penal law. These have been definitely rejected by Italian judges.
Regarding the specific complaint leading to the judgement and penalty, Paulo states. “…that PACTO, in 2014, held out a civil suit against Ecoservice and hired a private investigator for purchasing from our production headquarter, at two occasions, nr. 6 cartridges, without specifying, at the moment of the purchase, the intention to buy a “compatible” or “remanufactured” (this can be deducted by the investigators’ statements and by the investigative report, which is attached to the proceedings of PACTO). In the transport document which Pacto itself has attached in the proceeding, it is clear that the delivered cartridges were actually “compatible” and that these were not passed off as “remanufactured”, even though the cartridges were packed in non-coherent boxes (as in that moment the proper boxes were not available).”
According to Paolo “The first instance judge has incredibly accepted the requests of PACTO, only the basis of the witness proof requested by the complaining party, considering it reliable despite its general nature at the time of examination by the judge and the paper documents produced by PACTO itself. That [according to Paolo] contradict their own witness and the evident contradiction between the investigative report and what has been reconstructed by Pacto during the proceedings and that the witness proofs of Ecoservice that are coherent with all objective probative elements reported as well by PACTO.”
Paolo also states “A further mistake of the Judge consists in having believed in a damage based on the fact that cartridges had been sold at an anti-competitive price, lower than its market value. This is pure judiciary fantasy, since PACTO has not mentioned about nor the market prices of remanufactured nor the prices of the compatible ones in the process. Therefore, the judge could not know the market price of the cartridges, object of the process matter; yet he accepted the request of PACTO.”
In closing his email Paolo states “For all these reasons, and as Ecoservice has already appealed to the Italian Justice, we believe that the statements appeared on “The Recycler”, that describe the event as an “An act that can qualify as unfair competition conduct that <<directly or indirectly of any other means not complying with the principles of professional and appropriate fairness to hurt the other company.>>” are absolutely unfounded, incorrect and not permanently proven.
According to Paolo, Ecoservice has sent a “cease or desist order”, to the association PACTO alledging their behaviour “is exceeding the limits of correctness between the competing companies.”
Editors note: The above story is based on Mr Santarelli Paolo’s email in response to our story published on the 13th September and following our editorial guidelines allowed a right of response.
The Recycler editorial guidelines offer a right of reply where there is significant criticism or allegations of wrongdoing because it can help achieve accuracy in our news output.