Spanish government intervenes in package holiday reimbursements
Spanish travel agents and tour operators have welcomed a new government decree that enables them to issue pre-paid vouchers in an effort to ease a deluge of reimbursements on package holidays due to Covid-19. David Ing reports
The Association of Specialized Travel Agencies (ACAVE) said the move would enable them to ‘take a breather’ at a time when many airlines were refusing cash refunds on plane tickets, while Travel Agents’ Union UNAV praised it as ‘magnificent news to relieve a badly treated sector’. ACAVE said that the flexible approach offered by the government could also be a solution for other suppliers involved in a package holiday that are not subject to regulations on cash refunds for clients.
It also welcomed the extension of up to 60 days the government has allowed for agencies to sort out the spike in cancellations as a result of the virus: “In the face of the flood of cancellations, it will permit travel agencies to duly manage with all the services (airlines, accommodations and activities) and do all that is within their scope to get refunds on them for their clients.”
However, the association said it would be maintaining its official complaints against individual airlines, which it said were failing to comply with European Union regulations on cash refunds in the case of customers refusing to accept vouchers. While the airlines were pushing the EU to let them issue flight vouchers, ACAVE said that the European Commission needed to ‘focus on solving the main risk posed by this crisis for consumers: the risk of losing the money paid in the case of an airline declaring itself bankrupt’.
Similar complaints have already been lodged with the government by major Spanish consumer associations. However, ACAVE said that such organisations should not encourage people on the grounds of being frightened to travel to reclaim money as that was more of a ‘subjective feeling’ and only causing confusion.
The easing up of regulations on package holidays had been called for by various travel trade organisations ever since the outbreak of Covid-19 in Spain.
The new government decree allows for the vouchers to be used for up to a year after the country’s current state of alarm is lifted, or for the value to then be paid back to the customer.
UNAV said the measure was ‘justified because agencies were left unprotected, given that they had to pay the money in advance to clients, as they acted as intermediaries with airlines, hotels and other companies’.