Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

732 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE inevitably go beyond the Directive, as they aim at responding to general obligations (for example, relating to insolvency protection or enforcement) imposed on Member States by the Directive. Moreover, other provisions or absence of provisions in the Law mirror choices made by the Cypriot legislator in relation to matters (such as, the liability of the retailer) about which the Directive afforded Member States an option. 3.1. Differences in the wording between the Directive and the Law A first group of differences are found in the “definitions” provision, namely Article 2 of the Law. First of all, Article 2 contains certain definitions additional to the ones in the (corresponding) Article 3 of the Directive. These additional definitions are relatively unremarkable, as they are for the terms “Republic” (the Republic of Cyprus), “Authorized Service” (the Consumer Protection Service of the Ministry of Energy, Commerce, Industry and Tourism), “Union” (the EU), “Regulation 181/2011”, “Regulation 524/2013”, “Regulation 1177/2010”, “Regulation 261/2004”, “Regulation 392/2009”, “Regulation 1107/2006”, “Regulation 1371/2007”, “Member State”, “Minister” (the Minister of Energy, Commerce, Industry and Tourism), “the European Economic Area”, “Financial Institution” (defined broadly to encompass not only banks but also, amongst others, licensed insurance companies, payment institutions and electronic money institutions) and “licensed insurer”. More important differences exist in relation to the definitions of the terms “package” in Article 3(2), “linked travel arrangement” in Article 3(5) and “unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances” in Article 3(12) of the Directive. In relation to the first two, the corresponding definition in Article 2(1) of the Law, specifies the minimum percentage of the proportion of the combined value of the services that the value of the tourist services should represent for a combination involving the purchase of only one type of travel service to constitute a “package” or a “linked travel arrangement”. More specifically, if the value of the tourist services accounts for less than the 25% of the value of the combination (between a travel service and one or more tourist services), the value of the tourist services will not be considered as accounting for a significant proportion of the combined value of the services. Accordingly, one of the necessary ingredients of a “package” and a “linked travel arrangement” will be absent and the combination will not qualify as such a package or arrangement. The Cypriot legislator has essentially defined the “significant proportion” criterion in the Directive, which is desirable. Definitions in legislation, especially