This consultation stems from the Single Market Strategy which announced several actions to further develop the Single Market for services, in particular:

1. An initiative introducing a Services Passport for key economic sectors
2. An action to address regulatory barriers for key business services and for construction services
3. An action on professional indemnity insurance requirements for business and construction service providers.

The preliminary assessments undertaken by the Commission over the past years have shown that, despite work on the implementation of the Services Directive, a number of requirements maintained by Member States still create barriers for the provision of services in other Member States. These seem to concern administrative requirements and, in some cases, regulatory requirements.

As a result, cross-border investment and trade of services has been rather limited for a few particular sectors, which, paradoxically have high cross-border integration potential: business services (in particular architectural, engineering and accountancy services) and construction services.

The aim of this consultation is to seek the views of stakeholders on the effect on the ground of these administrative and regulatory obstacles, as well as on different policy options that could be pursued to address them, including their potential impact. Further background information to the actions covered by the consultation can be found in this presentation.

Stakeholders are invited to share their experiences, in full confidentiality should they wish (see privacy statement below).

The results of this consultation will provide invaluable input for the Commission when preparing any future policy proposals and assessing the impact of different policy options.

This consultation will remain accessible for a 12-week period, until 26 July 2016.

With this consultation the Commission seeks views from all interested parties - in particular from:

1. Service providers and customers of business services such as architecture, engineering and accountancy
2. Service providers and customers of construction services
3. Service providers or customers of insurance services and public authorities.

ACCESS THE QUESTIONNAIRE

The questionnaire of the consultation is divided into several different sections. Respondents can choose to reply to a selection of these sections (one, several or all) according to their profile/type of activity:

• Questions on services sectors in general (other than business services and construction) [questions 10 to 15]
• Questions on business services – perspective of service providers [questions 16 to 46]
• Questions on business services – perspective of customers [questions 47 to 52]
• Questions on construction services – perspective of service providers [questions 53 to 77]
• Questions on construction services – perspective of customers [questions 78 to 82]
• Questions on insurance – perspective of service providers [questions 83 to 96]
• Questions on insurance – perspective of insurers [questions 97 to 100]
• Questions for national authorities [questions 101 to 107]
• General questions on scope of the actions [questions 108 to 111]  

Practical information

Organisations must register in the Transparency Register before they begin to answer the questions. The submissions of non-registered organisations will be published separately from those of registered ones as the input of individuals.

This consultation takes place in accordance with the general framework related to the protection of personal data.