Curfew or pool closed? If there are impairments due to Covid-19 measures, travel companies have to reimburse part of the price – even if they are not responsible for it. The ECJ decided that.
Package holidaymakers who have been thwarted by Corona can in principle demand money back from the tour operator. A corresponding EU directive is also applicable to corona restrictions, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) decided in a judgment published on Thursday. The tour operator cannot claim that the authorities and not he is responsible for the corona measures.
The background is a case from Germany. The two plaintiffs booked a two-week package tour to Gran Canaria in March 2020 with FTI Touristik. Two days after their arrival, the authorities closed the beaches and imposed a curfew due to the corona pandemic. Access to pools and loungers was forbidden in the hotel, and the animation program was discontinued. After a week the trip ended.
The plaintiffs demanded that the tour operator reimburse them 70 percent of the price. He refused, arguing that he didn’t have to take responsibility for such a “general life risk”. The two then went to court, and the Munich I Regional Court, where the case ended up in the second instance, asked the ECJ for a ruling on how the Package Travel Directive should be interpreted.
The promised services were not provided the judges ruled. And the directive provides for “no-fault liability on the part of the tour operator”. The only exception: He does not have to reimburse any money if the tourists themselves are to blame for the defects (in legal German they are called “contract violations”). However, this is not the case with corona restrictions.
The ECJ did not decide how much money the two plaintiffs would get back. The Munich Regional Court must determine that and also assess to what extent the value of the trip has been reduced by a closed beach or pool – or by the fact that the tourists could not visit the island (Case number C-396/21).