Dear Mr X,
On 12 August 1999 you lodged a complaint with the European Ombudsman on behalf of Y in which you alleged that the European Union of Small and Medium-sized Companies (EUMC) had not paid to Y the money advanced by the Commission for organising Euro-information conferences.
On 20 September 1999, I forwarded the complaint to the President of the European Commission. On the same date I wrote to the Acting Director of the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), where this case had also been registered, in order to inform him of your complaint and to keep me informed of the developments of the case. On 11 October 1999, the Acting President of OLAF replied.
On 5 October 1999 you sent a letter in order to inform me that there were no reasons anymore to maintain your complaint.

THE COMPLAINT

According to the complainant, the relevant facts were as follows:
The complainant is president of Y which organised in 1997 in the Netherlands, jointly with the European Union of Small and Medium-sized Companies, 15 Euro-information conferences. The EUMC which received from the Commission a subsidy of an amount of 285.000 Euros had subsequently to pay Y for the conferences that had been organised. Y prepared full reports about the conferences, completely in accordance with the conditions of the subsidy, as communicated to Y by the president of EUMC.
However, after some time it appeared that the president of EUMC would not pay Y the subsidy already advanced by the Commission. Different attempts by Y to settle the financial arrangement of the conferences with EUMC remained without result. Y consequently withdrew its membership form EUMC. In order to inquire into those financial problems, the complainant then contacted different officials in DG X (Information) of the Commission in the summer of 1998, as well as in October 1998. The complainant was informed that the president of EUMC has asked for even more advances of subsidies, and that another body which equally organised a conference in another Member State had also complained about the EUMC’s failure to come to a financial settlement. The Commission informed the complainant also that it is inadmissible that the money advanced is not being used for the purpose for which it was foreseen. However, given that Y had a contractual relation only with EUMC, the Commission informed the complainant that it could not intervene in this dispute between the parties.
The complainant later wrote to the Commission on 5 May 1999, but never received a reply. The president of EUMC finally declared that for a financial claim one should contact his lawyer.
For those reasons, the complainant wrote to the Ombudsman alleging that 1) DG X had not replied to his letter of 5 May 1999, and 2) that the Commission had not intervened in this matter. At the same time, the complainant sent his file to OLAF, certain Commissioners and the President of the European Parliament.
In a letter dated 5 October 1999 the complainant however informed the Ombudsman that the responsible services of the Commission had started to deal with the matter and that, therefore, there were no reasons anymore to maintain his complaint.

THE INQUIRY

The Ombudsman’s services contacted the European Anti-Fraud Office by phone on 15 September 1999 and were informed that the complainant’s file had been registered at OLAF under A/7071 and had been attributed to the unit of Mr Chamla. On 20 September 1999, the Ombudsman therefore wrote to the acting Director of OLAF asking to be kept informed about the developments of the case. On 11 October, the acting Director wrote to inform the Ombudsman that it had been associated by the Secretariat General in the preparation of the Commission’s comments and that the Ombudsman would be fully informed in this framework.

THE DECISION

1 The alleged failure to reply and to intervene by the Commission
1.1 The complainant alleged that DG X of Commission had not replied to his letter dated 5 May 1999, nor intervened to settle the failure of the European Union of Small and Medium-sized Companies to pay to Y the subsidy for the Euro-information conferences which it had organised.
1.2 On 5 October 199, the complainant informed the Ombudsman that there were no reasons anymore to maintain his complaint, because the responsible services of the Commission had started to deal with the subject of his complaint.
2 Conclusion
It appears from the information supplied to the European Ombudsman by the complainant that he wishes to drop the complaint. The Ombudsman has therefore decided to close the case.
The President of the European Commission will also be informed of this decision.
Yours sincerely,
Jacob SÖDERMAN