Tourism Law in Europe

16 responsibilities of the operators in a different manner, depending on the stipulation of a “package travel contract” or an “intermediate travel contract”. According to the “political” objective of remaining as faithful as possible to the text of EU regulations, a relevant effort was made to offer a significant consolidation of the “traveller” position – a different notion compared to that of “consumer” and “tourist”, previously introduced in the Italian legal system – without prejudice to the further rights already provided for by the Tourism Code. Article 33(1)(a) TC includes, in the definition of “travel service”, the provision of passenger transport, accommodation that “is not an integral part of passenger transport”, the so-called “rental” of cars or other motor vehicles and any other tourist service that “is not an integral part of one of the tourist services” mentioned. Under article 33(1)(c), the “package travel” is characterised by the combination of contracts offered by single providers or by individual contracts offered by multiple providers, under the conditions set by applicable rules and regulations, “of at least two different types of tourist services within a single trip or holiday”. However, the application of the new rules is limited to package travels, the duration of which exceeds 24 hours or include an overnight stay – therefore, simple “excursions” are excluded in order to avoid an unnecessary increase of obligations for the organiser in relation to situations where the need to protect travellers seems minor. In addition, the combination of individual tourist services can only give rise to a package travel if they account for at least 25% of the value of the combination and are not advertised or otherwise represent an essential element or are selected and purchased only after the beginning of the transport, accommodation or vehicle rental service. The principle that invoicing the different elements of the same package separately does not exempt the organiser or the seller from their obligations under the law shall remain in force. The current regulation also covers customised and tailor-made packages, online contracts and dynamic packages, as well as services purchased from separate professionals through affiliate or click-through. As in the past, it is not disputed that the “cruise contract” is a typical package travel contract, characterised by the particular type of tourist services offered by the organising shipping company. Compared to the previous rules, the new ones significantly improve the travellers’ position and establish a new framework for their relations with the organiser of the