Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

1006 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE services included in a package”. However, the provisions of the Travel Directive do not define the concept of conformity (did not regulate the conformity rule), it is presumable that the definition and interpretation of ‘conformity rule’ are left to the discretion of Member States. In any case, the boundaries of the Travel Directive will be defined by the ECJ in its practice. The Lithuanian legislator links this concept with not meeting the legitimate expectations of the tourist and failure to provide services included in the package travel contract under the terms of the contract. As it is referred to, in Article 6.754 (1) of Civil Code, “the tour organiser must perform the package travel contract taking account of the legitimate expectations that the tourist may have in view of the nature of the package travel contract and services provided (...)”. Accordingly, Article 6.754 (2) provides that “if the services included in the package travel contract are not provided in accordance with the terms of the contract, the tour organiser must remedy the shortcomings identified by the tourist within a reasonable period set by the tourist”. Therefore, the conformity rule, according to the Civil Code, regulating package travel contract specifically refers to the terms of the contract and the legitimate expectations of the tourist, taking into account the nature of the package travel contract and services provided. As it can be seen from the text of Travel Directive, the idea, reflected in Articles 13 and 14 is that the traveller, in case of misperformance of package travel contract, has the right to: remedy of the lack of conformity by the organiser or by himself; be offered alternative arrangements; request for price reduction and/or compensation for damages; and terminate the contract. However, this sequence of possible ways, via which the tourist can defend his rights, in case the package travel contract is not performed according to legitimate expectations (starting from the remedying and moving towards the termination), is not that clear from the national rules. Before going into detail, it must be mentioned that the obligation of the traveller to inform the organiser, without undue delay of any lack of conformity of the travel service, set in Article 13 (2) of the Travel Directive, was not transposed into Article 6.754 of the Civil Code.. Instead, the obligation to make such claims was set in Article 25 (1) of Law on Tourism, together with the introduction of the form requirement, and stating that these claims have to be in writing or using another durable medium. As the Travel Directive does not limit to the written form, in which the organiser has to be informed about the lack of conformity, the national regulation goes beyond the limits set by the Travel Directive, preventing the tourists from informing the organiser about the