The Responsibility of Public Service Concessions in Argentine Law

The paper provides an approach to the Argentinean law on Public Service users claims. It is divided in three sections: First, a brief presentation of Argentinean laws and regulations, then, a chapter that represents the conceptual heart of this paper and where the cases on the subject are described in detail; finally, it is concluded by an exposure of episodes that reveal the underlying conflict of interest on the matter. In the first section, it is of special interest the analysis of the Argentinean consumer protection Act, amended in 2008, establishing a clear strengthening of consumer and user protection. The case review – which analyzes judgments of the Argentinean Supreme Court of Justice and other tribunals and lower courts-, focuses on the main issues of the claims. In this way, and assuming the controversies deal with matters of a contractual nature, the implementation of concessionaire or Public Service provider’s duty of safety is analyzed, the paper also analyzes the cases that have invoked the injured party possible negligence and the legal consequences deriving from the administrative claim previous to the jurisdictional instance (which is processed by the Public Service Regulation Agencies. In general, there is a review on the controversies concerning the fulfillment or breach of contractual obligations, which involves the administrative regulations that apply to each service. Finally, several cases are described upon that indicate a progressive evolution toward criteria of higher consumer and user protection, and make possible the perception of the different visions – in favor of or against facilitating pecuniary claims such as the ones indicated -, that influenciate in general the problem that is address in this work.