Tourism Law in Europe

7 organisers of package tours (‘organisers’), and providers of other tourism services as part of package tours. ” 26 . As cited above, the EU Commission has reflected upon the effects of this crisis on the parties of various travel contracts. The Commission recommendation (EU) 2020/648 stresses the importance of preserving passengers’ rights, as encumbered under the Package Travel Directive. Therefore, its recommendation concerning vouchers that carriers or organisers may propose to passengers or travellers, as an alternative to reimbursements in money, shall be subjected to the passenger’s or traveller’s voluntary acceptance. As already mentioned above, the recent Slovak Amendment of the Package Travel Act 27 resulted in infringement proceedings, following the Commission’s letter of formal notice. It may be assumed that in the next months the Slovak republic will be “forced” to accommodate the requirements of the Commission, while the relevant Act will be amended and supplemented again. The current solution for the COVID-19 crisis enacted by the Amendment of Package Travel Act outlines the following steps to provide relief to the detrimental effects of COVID-19 travel bans on travel businesses within the field of package travels. Provided that an emergency situation due to COVID-19 comes to pass in the Slovak Republic, or a similar situation at the destination or at any point of the itinerary, which makes it impossible to provide the passenger with the basic features of tourism services under the package travel contract, the travel organiser shall follow these steps: 1. deliver an offer to change the contract to the traveller; 2. provide a notification of a voucher on a substitute package, if the offer under subparagraph 1) has not been accepted by the traveller; 3. the right to refuse the voucher for the substitute package, within a set time limit, belongs only to specific persons 28 to which the price of the package will be subsequently refunded; 26 Commission recommendation (EU) 2020/648 of 13 May 2020 on vouchers offered to passengers and travellers as an alternative to reimbursement for cancelled package travel and transport services in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. 27 Zákon č. 136/2020 Z. z.. ktorým sa dopĺňa zákon č. 170/2018 Z. z. o zájazdoch, spojených službách cestovného ruchu, niektorých podmienkach podnikania v cestovnom ruchu a o zmene a doplnení niektorých zákonov v znení zákona č. 119/2019 Z. z. ( Act no 136/2020 Coll. On amendment of the Package Travel Act) 28 E.g. persons directly economically affected by Covid-19 (unemployed, businesses granted a financial contribution under a project to support the maintenance of employment in connection with the declaration of a state of emergency), single parents, pregnant persons, over 65 years old.