Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

1036 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE case-law (although not bound by the law of precedence), the Tribunal only awards moral damages if the plaintiffs request the Tribunal to consider such moral damages, as it cannot do so on its own initiative. “A tribunal may, when determining the issues in dispute in any claim or counter-claim before it, order the trader to pay to the consumer a sum of not less than thirty-five euro (€35) and not more than five hundred euro (€ 500) as moral damages for any pain, distress, anxiety and inconvenience.” Moreover, it is at the sole discretion of the Tribunal whether to award moral damages or not. As the Tribunal’s decisions are in the Maltese language, it would be wise to provide some examples translated into English, as the meaning of package travel could be seen through practical and real examples. In an interesting decision by the Consumer Claims Tribunal was decided on 6 February 2019, in the names of Analise Domancich versus The Cruise & Travel Group. In brief: on 28 March 2018, the plaintiff filed a complaint against the defendant company, requesting a refund of € 2,874.00, as a partial payment for a cruise (operated by Princess Cruises) that she had gone to in November 2017, whereby the cruise did not meet her expectations, as it was advertised as a five- -star cruise. The defendant company claimed that the plaintiff filed the complaint incorrectly, as the Cruise and Travel Group was merely a marketing name and it was not the correct Company, in line with the Commercial Code, since it actually was A. Von Brockdorff Services Ltd., and so, in its reply, the defendant company stipulated that it was not responsible for any shortcomings with regard to the cruise liner. In fact, the defendant company was only acting as agents of the Princess Cruises, and only accepted booking and reservations, and hence, could not be held liable nor responsible for the services that would have taken place outside these parameters, particularly as the complaint was specific to the services rendered on board the cruise liner. The facts of the case were that the plaintiff was looking for the “perfect honeymoon” and so, the advert by “The Cruise and Travel Group” attracted her attention, since it was a cruise in Asia, with “ top notch ” service. The representative of the company informed the plaintiff that this was a “ 5-star plus cruise liner ” and so she booked by paying a deposit, since the total of the cruise was € 5,740.26. This included, flights (€ 1,674.00), one night in Singapore (€ 473.40) and the cruise (€ 3,592.86), but it did not include excursions, tips and drinks