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Holiday Accident and Holiday Travel Injury Lawyers
If you suffer an accident abroad, you may be worried that any personal injury claim you make will end up going through the courts of that country as opposed to the UK legal system. However, if your injury occurred while you were on a package holiday, you may be able to have your case heard at home.
The Package Travel, Package Holidays and Package Tours Regulations 1992 have provisions in place for this, but before you proceed it is important to ascertain whether your holiday can be legally considered as a package.
What is a package holiday?
In order to be legally considered a package holiday, you must have purchased at least two core components of your trip at an inclusive price from the same provider. This can include transport, accommodation and any other services that make up a significant amount of your holiday, such as prearranged excursions.
The phrase ‘inclusive price’ is key here, as an understanding of this concept is crucial if you hope to make a successful compensation claim.
A potential grey area can occur if a separate account was submitted by your holiday company for each component of the trip. Here, the question is whether or not you could have purchased just one of those services separately at the same rate. If so, then your arrangement is less likely to be considered a package.
Making a successful claim
As with any personal injury claim, you must be able to show your accident was someone else’s fault. In this instance, that means proving liability on the part of your holiday company.
You will need to show that they failed to live up to the standards of ‘proper performance’ under the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982 and the Sale of Goods Act 1979. A strong claim will be able to show how they provided neither ‘reasonable skill and care’ nor ‘satisfactory quality’.
Where your holiday takes place may well also have some bearing on the outcome of your claim. There are instances where a holiday company has cited ‘local standards’ to defend themselves, suggesting that the service they provided was adequate based on the usual expectations in that region.
Finally, it is important to note that if you are injured on an excursion, the holiday company is only liable for this if you purchased it from them as part of your original deal. Injuries sustained on days out booked after you arrive at your destination cannot be considered as part of a package holiday.
Sheldon Davidson Solicitors can offer expert advice on cases of this nature, so get in touch with the team today to see whether you could make a claim.
