Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

THE TAX IMPLICATIONS OF COMBINED TRIPS 601 contractual clauses, given their legal origin. The tax is a public benefit of art of art. 31.3 of the Constitution. Thus, the origin of the legal-tax relationship is ex lege , pursuing the satisfaction of public spending. This does not prevent tax legal relations in their case from being able to be subject to interparty agreements, outside the Public Treasury, with the warning that “[ t ] he elements of the tax obligation cannot be altered by acts or agreements of individuals, who will not produce effects before the Administration, without prejudice to their legal-private consequences ”, as recommended by art. 17.5 General Tax Law. That is, the alteration of the tax obligations, of those called to satisfy them, can take place, and be, in principle legitimate in the privatist dimension, but never in the face of the Public Treasury. Another question is whether these agreements are detrimental to the weakest part, that of consumers and users, alteration with merely private effects, but which, depending on the cases, may become considered an abusive clause, on which we will not enter for exceeding the object of our work. As we say, the mentions made by the Directive on combined trips to taxation have as their object the information duties, the aspects concerning the modification of prices or the rights to increase the price by the organisers in the face of an increase in taxes. Also the rights of the consumer to terminate the contract if this increase exceeds a certain percentage 2 . 2 Recital 33 of the Directive states that “In certain cases organisers should be allowed to make unilateral changes to the package travel contract. However, travellers should have the right to terminate the package travel contract if the changes alter significantly any of the main characteristics of the travel services. This may for instance be the case if the quality or the value of the travel services diminishes. Changes of departure or arrival times indicated in the package travel contract should be considered significant, for instance, where they would impose on the traveller considerable inconvenience or additional costs, for instance rearrangement of transport or accommodation. Price increases should be possible only if there has been a change in the cost of fuel or other power sources for the carriage of passengers, in taxes or fees imposed by a third party not directly involved in the performance of the travel services included in the package travel contract or in the exchange rates relevant to the package and only if the contract expressly reserves the possibility of such a price increase and states that the traveller is entitled to a price reduction corresponding to a decrease in those costs. If the organiser proposes a price increase of more than 8 % of the total price, the traveller should be entitled to terminate the package travel contract without paying a termination fee”. For its part, Article 5 of the Directive, relating to: “Pre-contractual information”, clarifies that “1 . Member States shall ensure that, before the traveller is bound by any package travel contract or any corresponding offer, the organiser and, where the package is sold through a retailer, also the retailer shall provide the traveller with the standard information by means of the relevant form as set out in Part A or Part B of Annex I, and, where applicable to the package, with the following information [...] c) the total price of the package inclusive of taxes and, where applicable, of all additional fees, charges and other costs or, where those costs cannot reasonably be calculated in advance of the conclusion of the contract, an indication of the type of additional costs which the traveller may still have to bear”. Also art. 10 of the Directive, which deals with “Alteration of the Price”, refers to fees and taxes. It considers, in its section 1, that “Member States shall ensure that after the conclusion of the package travel contract, prices may be increased only if the contract expressly reserves that possibility and states that the traveller is entitled to price reduction under paragraph 4. In that event the package travel contract shall state how price revisions are to be calculated. Price increases shall be possible exclusively as a direct consequence of changes in: (a) the price of the carriage of passengers resulting from the cost of fuel or other power sources; (b) the level of taxes or fees on the travel services included in the contract imposed by third parties not directly involved in the performance of the package, including tourist taxes, landing taxes or embarkation or disembarkation fees at ports and airports; or […]”.