The European Commission authorised, on Monday 6 February, a €1.5 billion French scheme to support insurers that cover travel organisers’ insolvency.
The scheme aims at ensuring an adequate insolvency insurance that is sufficient to: - refund travellers for any payment for services that were not provided because of the organiser's insolvency; - finance their eventual repatriation. This protection for travellers is provided for in the EU Package Travel Directive.
Insurers will transfer 75% of their premiums to the guarantee fund, which will in turn cover 75% of potential losses up to an overall maximum of €1.5 billion.
In addition, insurers will be compensated for the operating costs of providing the insolvency protection. The measure is open to all insurers and other guarantors offering insolvency protection to travel organisers. To benefit from the scheme, insurers and other guarantors must be legally authorised to operate in France and must provide insolvency protection to travel organisers registered with the French tourism development agency. The scheme will run until 31 December 2023. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)