Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

990 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE the Protection of Consumer Rights, and disputes about infringed rights may be taken to court”. The ADR procedure, according to the Law on the Protection of Consumer Rights 26 , applies only to the consumers, excluding those who are not consumers (i.e. consumers in a broader sense). Therefore, one can raise a question: how the reference found in Article 25 (2) of the Law on Tourism shall be interpreted: as the reference to all travellers or only to travellers-consumers? Moreover, in travaux preparatoires there was no indication regarding the necessity of additional funding to the activity of the state institution responsible for the ADR system since the broadened definition includes more persons that presumably might increase the quantity of the applications. It might be the shortest way to solve this ‘consumer-traveller’ dilemma, just by making reference to the Law on Tourism or to the Civil Code, stating that the regulation devoted to the consumers also apply to the travellers who are not consumers in a narrow sense. However, it is questioned whether it would be in line with the intention of the Travel Directive to avoid confusion with the definition of the term ‘consumer’ used in other EU legislation? According to the Travel Directive, the counterpart of the traveller is the trader. The ‘trader’ concept in the Travel Directive is realised by three terms and their definitions: trader; organiser; and retailer 27 . The ‘trader’ concept is transposed into Lithuanian Law by two definitions: tour organiser and travel retailer. Additionally, the terms ‘vendor of linked tourist service arrangements’ and ‘tourist service provider’ are defined. The Law on Tourism establishes formal requirements for the activity of the tour organiser, the travel retailer and the vendor of linked tourist service arrangement. The requirements differ depending on the activity. Firstly, what differs is the licence form – the tour organiser must have the licence, the other two must submit the declaration to the supervisory institution. Secondly, the tour organiser must meet the impeccable repute requirement, but the other two do not. Thirdly, the requirements concerning the security of the obligations are applied to the tour organiser and the vendor of linked tourist service arrangement, but not to the travel retailer. And fourthly, the extent of the obligations is broader for the tour organiser than for the retailer or the vendor of linked tourist service arrangement. However, there are some identical requirements for all three: they have to ensure that their own capital (public or private limited company) would be at least half of the stated 26 The Republic of Lithuania Law on Consumer Rights Protection adopted by the Law No. I-657, as of 19 November 1994. 27 Article 3 (7), (8), (9) of the Travel Directive.