Legal Quiz

Storyline One:

JO and Jane Simple make a last minute booking a holiday in Cuba. Because they have left it all so late they have to collect their tickets at the airport.

They do so and are told that the destination is Ovda. They think nothing of this – not knowing much about geography – and board the aircraft having gone through extensive security checks.

While on board the pilot announces the route and tells everyone how long it will be before they arrive in Israel.

Of course, Jo and Jane are extremely perplexed and begin to make enquiries with the stewardess. She, in turn, is extremely confused and can’t believe that the couple think they are going to Cuba.

Upon arrival at Ovda they are arrested, and incarcerated for five days before eventually being repatriated.

But the tour operator compels them to pay for the return flight since it was not on the booked flight.

Upon their return Jo and Jane make straight for their lawyer. They try to make a claim against the travel agent for making the booking error, the tour operator for not helping them while they were in prison and the tour operator for hitting them with the additional flight charge.

Has the travel agency any liability?

Has the tour operator any obligation to help?

Is the tour operator entitled to charge for the additional flight?

Question one: Yes – on the assumption that it was the travel agency’s error, although the customers should have paid proper attention at the airport and there may well be arguments over contributory negligence.

Question two: Yes – even though it may not have been the tour operators fault, it should render all proper assistance.

Question three: Possibly – if the original fault was not with the tour operator.

MANCE and five friends have booked a trip to Barcelona in August. It is Mance’s Hen Night (avid readers will no doubt recall her planned Las Vegas Wedding).

It is a weekend package which includes two nights’ accommodation at a three star hotel.

The tour operator (Good Time Tours) has been told that it is a hen trip, and goes out of its way to make sure the girls have a good time. It arranges for bottles of wine as greeting presents in the hotel.

The first evening is riotous. Mance and her friends go from bar to bar and from club to club, returning to the hotel at 5.30am in a very relaxed state.

The hotel porter refuses to let them in, not least because of the accompanying males, the half drunk bottles of Cava and varying states of undress everybody finds themselves in. Mance and friends accept this with good cheer and turn round to find another watering hole.

When they return to the hotel at midday their bags have been packed and the hotel manager is waiting for them.

He takes the girls to one side and says words to the effect of ‘never darken my doorstep again’.

Undaunted, they leave their baggage at the railway station left luggage and continue carousing right through their break, sleeping on the beach when they have to.

They eventually turn up at the airport on Sunday. The carrier refuses to let them board.

When they eventually get back to the UK some six days later, the good cheer has certainly warn off and they make claims against Good Times Tours.

Has Good Times Tours any liability for the actions of the hotel porter?

Has Good time Tours any liability for the actions of the hotel manager?

Has Good Time Tours any liability for the actions of the carrier?

Question one: Possibly yes, particularly if the porter did not explain that the girls could come in provided they were reasonably well behaved.

Question two: Yes, his actions were extremely high handed and without any real justification.

Question three: No, if they were not in an appropriate state to board the aircraft.