Additionally, a company may not unilaterally increase the price that was agreed-upon when the contract was signed - whether for a limited or unlimited period - unless the price indexing method is legal and clearly indicated in the contract terms. Concerning unilateral modification of the product concerned by the contract, the LPMC does not prevent the company from reserving the right to unilaterally modify the nature of the product, as long as the change does not affect any of the product's essential characteristics according to both parties. 

Lastly, contracts which contain a penalty clause in favour of the company must also have a penalty clause which benefits the consumer. In other words, if the contract subjects the consumer to penalties for a contractual breach such as the non-payment of bills, the contract must contain symmetric terms which penalize the company if it doesn't fulfil its own obligations, such as providing the sold product.  

The general standard                       

If the terms in question don't fit into any of the thirty-three cases included in the blacklist, then they should be checked against the general standard which is a combination of the definition of unfair terms in articles 2.28 and 73 of the LPMC. The criteria used to determine whether contract terms are unfair is unquestionably whether there is an "obvious imbalance" to the detriment of the consumer.  As Cécile Delforge explains, the imbalance must not relate to "the object of the contract or the equivalence of the services agreed to by the contracting parties, […] such as for example a blatant inadequacy between the value of the product and the price paid by the consumer." Rather, she believes that the imbalance relates to the "equivalence of the contractual circumstances," that is equitable terms that show no prejudice to either party.     

When assessing the unfairness of contractual terms, the general rule in article 73 of the LPMC also requires that "the nature of products for which the contract was concluded," all the circumstances associated with the conclusion of the contract, as well as "the other contract terms or another contract upon which it depends" were taken into account.

A non-existent term in employment law 

Unlike consumer law, in which the meaning of "unfair terms" has been solidified through the definition provided by the LPMC, employment law is much more complex and imperative. Employment contracts must necessarily comply with all the laws and standards enacted by law, royal decree, or collective agreements between unions and employers. There are certain legal provisions from which employees and employees may not deviate, which leaves very little freedom. This legal rigidity explains why the term "unfair term" does not exist in employment law as it does in consumer law. During the symposium on Les clauses abusives et illicites dans les contrats usuels (Unfair and unlawful terms in common contracts), organised by the Young Bar Association of Liège, Fabienne Kéfer, Professor of Employment Law at ULg, was still able to find employment contract terms which created an obvious imbalance between the two parties by modelling her ideas on the definition taken from consumer projection law. Even if the collective psyche still sees workers as exploited since they are the economically weaker party, Fabienne Kéfer chose to eliminate such prejudices from her research so as not to exclude cases in which employment terms were actually unfair to employers.

"Originally there was no such thing as employment law. Relationships between employers and employees were only were subject to Civil Law based on the principle of individual freedom, with very few obligations,” says Fabienne Kéfer. This period of pure liberalism quickly led to the impoverishment of the working class. At the time, workers couldn't band together to defend their interests and put pressure on their employer to meet their demands. It was in this hostile climate at the end of the 19th century that employment law was born, to compensate for workers' economic inferiority and to assist them in their relationship with their employers. Things have changed quite a bit since then, and in addition to its protective role, employment law also includes a number of rules which are not just designed to improve working conditions, but are also created for political reasons - such as instituting longer working days, pushing back the retirement age, or suspending wage indexation.