Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

516 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE e) Basque Country . Law 13/2016 of 28 July 2016 on Basque Country tourism classifies as serious infringement (art. 94, section 11): non-compliance, by travel agencies, of the obligations related to the form, content, modification or resolution of contracts, provided in the legislationonpackage travel, includingover-contracting. In view of the classification of infringements, we can say that very serious infringements are not contemplated in relation to package travel, but minor and serious infringements are. We can also say that tourism laws have not taken into account the content of Directive 2015/2302 /(EU) of 25 November on package travel and travel related services nor its transposition by Royal Decree-Law 23/2018; therefore, “travel related services” are not explicitly provided and represent a new contractual type that often competes with package travel. This is the case, for example, of travel services that are accessed in a single visit or point of sale of an entrepreneur if the selection and payment of these services are provided separately or if the company facilitates the hiring of, at least, an additional travel service with another entrepeneur and it is hired no latter than 24 hours after the confirmation of the first travel service booking. In such cases, entrepreneurs shall inform travellers that they are hiring linked travel services and, therefore, they could not adhere to any of the rights that apply exclusively to package travel. New guarantees have also been introduced in case of insolvency and new responsibilities have been added for companies. For example, organisers and retailers shall provide a guarantee that will be activated freely in order to respond to the enjoyment of the package travel and the related travel services in general; especially for the reimbursement of advanced payments, the return transfer of the travellers to their place of departure or another agreed place and, if necessary, for accommodation prior to repatriation funding. In the case of linked travel services, the first entrepreneur to whom a service is hired and who facilitates the hiring of a second service with another company is obliged to provide a guarantee in case of insolvency for both services. It also shall be necessary to update the types related to travel agencies for the guarantees provided in articles 164 (effectiveness and scope of the guarantee against insolvency) and 165 (contractual liability guarantee) of the TRLGDCU. 3.3. Penalties on tourism policy Infringements against the provisions of laws and other provisions in tourism policy will lead to the imposition of a series of sanctions that could be called of