As an EU citizen I always used the Europass CV. So far no Employer, HR rep or even LinkedIn Recuriters ever told me to create my own version. I think they appriciate it because they know what to expect and makes a very good template. And making your own is more likely to go wrong than just using the template. It is very comprehensive and they have an online tool that lets you create it without having any Word document installed.
Only downside is that it gets tricky to edit unless you use that online editor. You have to re-import it and edit it that way unless you want to play around with Microsoft Word. But the format is consistent and its easy to read.
I can confirm in the EU europass is widely adopted.
I do not love it very much, but I appreciate the online tools to create/update them from XML descriptors, without having to mess with Word; on the other side, being a generic template, is not very fit to expose CS skills.
An employer I know (in the startup scene) said he trashed all europass CV as he assumed you are a dull corporate droid who did not even take time to write a customized CV...
That is great for all the people who prepared their CV in this format and avoided an employer who is unable to appreciate standards that work across borders or to realize that the information is more important than the format...
