Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

ARTICLE 27 | ALESSANDRA CORRADO 553 Moreover, amendments have also been necessary regarding Directive 2011/83/ EU 6 (since it does not apply to contracts covered by Directive 90/314), in order to ensure that it continues to apply to individual travel services that form part of a liked travel arrangement, insofar as those individual services are not otherwise excluded from the scope of Directive 2011/83/EU and that certain consumer rights laid down in that Directive also apply to packages. In consideration of the profound changes intervened in the travel market, the European legislator opted to achieve, with the new set of rules, a “full harmonization” 7 of the regulatory provisions, in order to facilitate the creation of an effective “European Union travel space” 8 . According to the provision set forth in Art. 4 of the Directive, the Member States are not allowed to maintain or issue in their national legislations, any provision which shall diverge from those set forth by the new Directive “ including more or less stringent provisions which would ensure a different level of traveller protection ”. As a consequence of such provision, and given the scope of maximum harmonisation aimed by the European legislator, Italy opted 9 for an extremely faithful transposition of the Directive, whose Italian version served as the basis for the Legislative transposition decree, as we will see later 10 . 6 Directive 2011/83/EU of the European Parliament and the Council of 25 October 2011 on consumer rights, amending Council Directive 93/13/EEC and Directive 1999/44/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and repealing Council Directive 85/577/EEC and Directive 97/7/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council. 7 See Recitals 2 through 6 of the Directive and Art 4. 8 For an overview of the choice made by the European legislator according to art. 4 of the Directive, see Keiler – Morandi, Package travel and assisted travel arrangements: The proposal for a new directive in light of a possible full harmonization approach , in Riv.it. Dir. Tur. 2014, p. 5 and Morandi, The Directive on package travel and linked travel arrangements: The traveller protection in a full harmonization approach , in Franceschelli – Morandi – Torres, The new package travel directive , cit. p. 401. 9 As to the main issues concerning the implementation of the Directive in Italy, see Morandi, The new european regulation of package travel and linked travel arrangements , in Dir. trasp. 2017, p. 99; R. Pasquili, La Direttiva2015/2302/UE: Contenuto e forma del contratto di viaggio , in Riv. dir. civ. , 2017, p. 1621; Rossoni, La Direttiva (UE) 2015/2302 relativa ai pacchetti turistici e ai servizi turistici collegati: una prima lettura , in Riv. it. dir. tur ., 2017, p. 88; De Cristofaro , La nuova disciplina europea dei contratti di viaggio (dir 2015/2302/UE) e le prospettive del suo recepimento nell’ordinamento italiano , in A. Finessi (ed.), La nuova disciplina europea dei contratti di viaggio. La direttiva 2015/2302/UE e le prospettive della sua attuazione nell’ordinamento italiano , Jovene, Napoli, 2017, p. 13; Lopez De Gonzalo, La nuova direttiva sui pacchetti turistici e la normativa internazionale e comunitaria in tema di trasporto di persone , in Di mar . 2016, 405 ss. 10 For a preliminary analysis of the transposition disciplines of the Directive in the various Member States, see Franceschelli – Morandi –Torres, The new package travel directive , cit.; in addition to the various articles published in Juris tourisme , 213/2018, 21 ss. i.e. Torres, L’Europe à l’avant garde de la protection des tourists: l’example portugais , ibidem, p. 24 ss.; Augros, L’expérience européenne: tour d’horizon et refléctions sur la transposition de la directive , ibidem, p. 21 ss.; Melgosa Arcos, Application de la directive en Espagne: une transposition tardive , ibidem, 31 ss; and the articles published in Journal of Consumer and Market Law , n. 3/2016; on the German law Führich, Pauschalreiserecht Umsetzung der Pauschalreiserichtlinie (EU) 2015/2302 in deutches Recht , in Neue Juristische Wochenschrift , 2017, p. 2945 ss.; as to the Austrian discipline, Keiler Bundesgesetz über Pauschalreisen und verbundene Reiseleistungen (Pauschalreisegesetz -PRG), in Keiler-Klauser (eds), Österreichisches und Europäisches Verbraucherrecht. Kommentar , Verlag. Österreich, 2018.