Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

1102 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE While for the main travel services provided for in subparagraphs (a), (b) and (c), no proportion is determined when combined by a single operator – two are sufficient for the purposes of the same trip or vacation – as will be the case for a flight and hotel or a fly-drive, the same does not happen with the secondary ones provided for in point d). When one of the main travel services, for example, accommodation, is combined with one or more unnamed tourist services listed in paragraph d), the following alternative requirements must be taken into account, as provided for in NPTD Article 3/2/(v)/second part and also Art. 2/3 of Decree-Law 17/2018, of 8 March. – they must represent a significant proportion of the trip; – the advertising points to an essential feature of the combination (hotel plus ticket for the final of a football competition); – or in any way represent that characteristic (golf package, i.e. hotel plus golf ). When do the travel services provided for in paragraph d) represent a significant part of the package travel or the linked travel arrangement? The criterion of a significant proportion of the trip is concretised by the European legislator, not in the Articles but in recital 18: “If other tourist services account for 25% or more of the value of the combination, those services should be considered as representing a significant proportion of the value of the package or linked travel arrangement”. However, the Portuguese legislator did not take into account the recitals’ extraordinary importance, not incorporating in the Decree-Law No. 17/2018, of 8 March, the referred percentage criterion. Contrary to the transpositions already carried out in the other Member States, namely in Germany, France or Austria, where the percentage of 25% is expressly shown in the transposition text. The intense secrecy that surrounded the process of transposing the NPTD in Portugal have undoubtedly contributed to several shortcomings, including the one I have just analysed. These are unnecessary flaws, as Portugal once again failed to comply with the harmonisation imposed by the European legislator in an aspect devoid of complexity.