Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

602 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE The most important thing, for this work, is not so much these references to taxation in the Directive, secondary by logic in a text that does not deal with the tax. For us, what is most interesting are the tax implications of the regulation on travel combined as a legal and economic reality, indicative of an economic capacity, taxed as taxes, as we have been commenting. Of the Directive of package travels we are interested in art. 2.1, which sets the following as its scope of application: “This Directive applies to packages offered for sale or sold by traders to travellers and to linked travel arrangements facilited by traders for travelers” , with some exclusions on which we will not enter. To continue pointing out the Directive in art 3.2, that by “package” we must understand “ the combination of at least two types of travel services for the purposes of the same trip or vacation ”. Analyzing the travel services included in art. 3.1 of the Directive, this leads us to deepen the following aspects: – Taxation of passenger transport (section II). In this section, we will make a brief reference to the taxation of rental cars, other motor vehicles or motorcycles, which is also considered as a travel service, according to the Directive in its art. 3.1 c). – The taxation of accommodation, when it is not an intrinsic part of passenger transport and does not have residential purposes (holiday purposes only). We will see the fiscal considerations of traditional accommodation in hotels or similar (section III), but also the new formulas, such as accommodation in apartments and tourist homes (section IV). – However, these services can be managed, either separately or as a package (trips according to art. 141. One VATL), which can bring the special regime of travel agencies into the VAT, regulated between the articles 141 to 147 VATL. Travel, for the purposes of this special regime, will be considered “ accommodation or transport services provided jointly or separately and, where appropriate, with others of an accessory or complementary nature thereof ”. This regime is mandatory if there are certain circumstances that determine its scope and that at the time we will comment, even briefly. Thus, in the last part of this work we will discuss some ins and outs of the special VAT regime to travel agencies (section V).