Travel problems: who is responsible?

Once upon a time, people who wanted to book a vacation called up their favorite travel agent who booked them a tour through a tour operator. The tour operator was the principal party responsible in case something went wrong on the travels and everyone seemed fairly clear about this.

People are not so clear now. As more and more people use the internet to book vacations and the travel industry shifts away from tour operators, there is an increasing need to define who is the responsible party in case of problems while traveling.

On one hand, tour operators are still selling package vacations. On the other hand, many individuals book their flights directly with airlines on the internet. And somewhere in between there are travel agents who use the internet to make some bookings on behalf of their clients.

So what’s the problem? In 2005, a low-cost airline EUjet collapsed. At the time of bankruptcy, 39,000 British passengers were booked to fly with the airline or were already abroad. The Civil Aviation Authority surveyed those passengers and found that two thirds of them thought that they had protection against the bankruptcy and would get their money back, but only 0.3 per cent of them were right.

If you are looking for safely and security when traveling, the best option is to book a package vacation. Andrew Morton, a lawyer who specializes in travel said,  “A package provides powerful consumer protection.There are lots of obligations on the person selling the holiday. If things go wrong you have the right of redress in the UK, and you are covered for everything if, say, a flight is cancelled and you don’t turn up at the hotel.”

If you aren’t into packaged vacations than things will be different. “People think they are covered by their travel insurance, but find they are not,” said Morton. It’s important to really discover what is and isn’t covered by your travel agent if you chose to book tickets on your own.

The legislation setting out who is primarily responsible in terms of travel insurance is currently being reviewed in Brussels but while the travel industry is constantly changing, it will take at least three or four years before even this legislation gets updated.  In the meantime, be sure to ask a lot of questions about your travel insurance, who is responsible and if you really are covered for everything you think you are.