Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

ARTICLE 1 | F. JAVIER MELGOSA ARCOS 85 In the case of performance of the guarantee, the travel agency or the association concerned, shall be obliged to replace it, without prior notification, within fifteen days to the cover the full amount thereof. The guarantee cannot be cancelled during the process of a withdrawing report of the registration, derived from the provision of services of the package. It must remain in force until one year has elapsed since the ruling in the administrative procedure of the corresponding withdrawing report of the registration. If the competent Directorate in terms of tourism was aware of the existence of pending civil claims for the hiring of package holidays, the guarantee could not be cancelled until final judicial or extrajudicial resolution. For this purpose, within ten days of its submission, the travel agencies must submit to the competent Directorate in terms of tourism a copy of the claims that have been submitted to them. Meanwhile, Article 12 of the Catalan decree (Amended by Decree 158/2012 of 20 November) provides that the guarantee must respond to repay the deposited funds and consumer repatriation, in the event of insolvency or bankruptcy. This guarantee cover three forms: (a) Individual guarantee: under bank guarantee or insurance policy. During the first year of business activity, this guarantee must cover a minimum of 100,000 euros. From the second year of business activity, its amount of guarantee must be equivalent to at least 3% of the annual turnover of the travel agent and, in any case, the amount cannot be lower than 100,000 euros, nor be higher than 300,000 euros. (b) Collective Guarantee: the travel agents and can constitute a collective guarantee through legally constituted business associations. The collective guarantee is a guarantee fund for all agents involved in it. The ways for constituting this collective guarantee will be the same as those indicated for the individual guarantee. The amount of the guarantee will be for a minimum of 50%of the amount of guarantees that travel agents, individually considered, should constitute in accordance with the preceding paragraph. In no case may the total amount of the fund be less than 2,500,000 euros. The collective guarantee will cover to each agent, at most, an amount equivalent to that established by the individual guarantee, in accordance with the preceding paragraph. (c) Guarantee for each package: the travel agent takes out insurance for each user of a package. By the time the user makes the first payment on account of the price of the package, the travel agent will deliver a document identifying the constituted guarantee and contact details of the guarantor agency.