HolidayTravelWatch continues to hear from Travel Consumers suffering ‘Significant Changes’ detriment in their holiday contracts. A recent call for help came from a Mr U, he stated:

“booked holiday to cyprus july 2007 to travel 25 may 2008 received final comformation letter 7 may quoting a different hotel this was then change again by the 13 may to hotel no 3 this was unacceiptable and i had to pay for an upgrade to stay on the beach but on arrival in cyprus there was record of a booking for this hotel and actually traveled to the resort not knowing where we would be staying can you please give me advice on possible actions i can take i have just sent the second letter of complaint to [NAME OF MAJOR TOUR OPERATOR] ”. (E.23.06)

Mr U has received advice and assistance from the team at HolidayTravelWatch.

Frank Brehany, the Senior Consumer Advocate of HolidayTravelWatch states;

“This has been one of the most significant areas of claim this 2008 holiday season.  This case is typical, and reflects a total disregard and respect for this paying customer and his consumer rights.  The Government and the EU Commission must get to grips with this issue – the Travel Industry is riding roughshod over ordinary consumers!”

All Holidaymakers affected by any of these issues should contact HolidayTravelWatch for further assistance.

Note to Editors:

Since 2005, HolidayTravelWatch has provided comment on the ever increasing threat to The Package Travel Regulations. This situation has developed partly through the changing style of purchasing holidays, but principally from the Court of Appeal decision as to what they considered constituted a ‘package’.

After considerable debate, the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (DBERR) has produced a Guidance note, in an attempt to assist with the definition as to what constitutes a ‘package’. Why is this definition important? Simply, if an agent or operator can show that they are simply selling components, then they will escape the regulatory requirements of the Air Tour Operator licence (ATOL) scheme and, the provisions of The Package Travel Regulations. If that is the case, then the hard fought rights to protect the consumer will be lost. The consumer will be unprotected.

We have contributed to the continued debate, submitting our report examining consumer detriment, to the EU Commission and DBERR in October 2007. In that report we highlighted th very real risk that is now faced by the British Travel Consumer, through 160 case studies. We have also provided what we consider to be the solution to the diminution of Travel Consumer rights.

The EU Commission are currently reviewing the Package Travel Directive, but the result of their enquiries, along with their recommendations, is not expected for some time. The reaction to the recent Guidance produced by DBERR, produced a cautious welcome from the Travel Industry, but it does not deal with their principle concern, that being the market operations of the airline industry. They argue, if they are subject to a regulatory regime, then so should the airline industry when they sell holidays on their websites. We have argued that any regulatory regime should apply across the board, not just to one segment of the Travel Industry.

We have predicted, a notion rejected by DBERR, that their Guidance note and the Court of Appeal decision gives a green light to those who want to ‘deregulate’ the package holiday.

HolidayTravelWatch has launched its petition, calling on Government and the EU Commission to protect the rights of Consumers in Holiday Contracts.

Tags: ABTA Code of Conduct, Free Holiday Complaints Letters, holiday complaints, Holiday Significant Change Claims

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 27th, 2008 at 10:54 am and is filed under HolidayTravelWatch PressCentre. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.