Brexit and Your Customer Booking Terms and Conditions
Following the surge of Brexit articles online and the impacts of Brexit on the travel industry, you might be asking “does any of this this affect my customer booking conditions?”
The answer to this will depend upon what, where and how you are selling. However, it’s likely that your customer booking conditions will be affected in some way.
We thought it would be helpful to put together a list of things to think about where you are selling as principal. The things you might want to look into are:
ATOL: will your ATOL cover all of your bookings in the same way as it has previously, or, has this changed for any sales you make into the EU?
PTRs: do your customer booking conditions and any relevant information schedules refer to the correct version of the PTRs, if you are selling packages? Are you still compliant with these PTRs?
ODR: do your customer booking conditions mention the Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) platform that will no longer be available to customers based in the UK?
Financial protection: do you accept customer payment in euros, target EU based customers or advertise in numerous languages? Does your current financial protection cover any sales into Europe post-Brexit? Please see our separate financial protection articles available on our website for more information.
Package sales: Do your customer booking conditions need to be updated to reflect any change to the corporate entity and any new financial protection arrangements post-Brexit? Do you need separate sets of booking conditions for UK and EU bookings?
Insurance / EHIC: do you want to ensure your customers obtain insurance for any Brexit related delays? Do you mention EHIC cards in your customer booking conditions that will no longer be valid for UK nationals?
Passports / visas: are your customers directed to sources providing information on passport / visa requirements post-Brexit?
Driving licences: do your customers require driving licences for their holiday? Do they have the correct documentation?
Pets: are your customers aware of any new requirements when taking pets abroad?
Currency: do you mention anything about exchange rates and who will bear the cost of these?
EEA / EU: do any references in your customer booking conditions to the EEA / EU / directives or similar, need to be updated?
If you would like to find out more about updating your customer booking conditions where you act as principal because of anything listed above, or, you feel you would like these or any other commercial agreements to be reviewed in light of Brexit, please get in touch with us, we’re very happy to assist.
We also have a longer Brexit article available here.
For further information on this, contact;
Emma Shakespeare, Head of Commercial and Corporate Governance – emma@travlaw.co.uk or
Kate Imeson, Solicitor – kate@travlaw.co.uk