Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

1166 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE Protection Act allows the organiser to rely on any limitation on the scope of the redress or of the conditions for the travel service provider’s liability which is laid down in international conventions binding the Republic of Slovenia 41 . Examples of such international acts mentioned in the explanatory note to the draft law are the Montreal Convention on the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air of 1999, the Convention concerning International Carriage by Rail (COTIF) of 1980 and the Athens Convention relating to the Carriage of Passengers and their Luggage by Sea of 1974 42 . The Directive provides that the limitation period for introducing claims for price reduction and limitation of damages should not be less than two years but does not define the starting point of this period. Consumer Protection Act stipulates that the traveller may bring these claims within two years since the non-compliance occurred. It should be pointed out, however, that the formulation of this provision indicates a fixed (preclusive) time limit for filing an action rather than a limitation period for the enforcement of contractual claims. This means that the two-year period since the non-compliance event cannot be interrupted or suspended under the general rules of the Obligations Code concerning limitation periods for contractual claims. For the purpose of compliance with time-limits or limitation periods, it is considered under Article 15 of the Directive that the organiser has received any traveller’s messages, requests or complaints as soon as these were received by the retailer. Article c57.f of the Consumer Protection Act provides the same in its second paragraph but does not explicitly limit the application of this legal fiction to time limits and limitation periods. This means that the provision could potentially be interpreted more extensively, e.g. as sufficient evidence that the organiser was aware of the content of the traveller’s request made to the retailer. 3.5. Insolvency Protection In the articles dealing with insolvency protection, the Consumer Protection Act uses the term “liquidity problems” rather than “insolvency”. It seems that the main purpose of this terminological innovation is to avoid using the overly complex definition of insolvency under the Financial Operations, Insolvency Proceedings and Compulsory Dissolution Act 43 , so the law relies on the absence 41 Article b57.f(2) of the Consumer Protection Act. 42 Proposal for an Act Amending the Consumer Protection Act (ZVPot-H), EVA 2017-2130-0030 , p. 42. 43 “Zakon o finančnem poslovanju, postopkih zaradi insolventnosti in prisilnem prenehanju (ZFPPIPP)”, Official Gazette of RS, No. 126/07, with further amendments.