EUPillar C-478/12 Armin Maletic and Marianne Maletic v lastminute.com Gmbh and TUI Österreich GmbH (Eighth Chamber)

Summary

The case concerns the interpretation of Art 16(1) of Brussels I. It was referred to the CJEU in the Austrian proceedings between Mr and Mrs Maletic (domiciled in Austria) and lastminute.com GmbH, (having its registered office in Germany) and TUI Österreich GmbH (having its registered office in Austria), concerning payment of a sum arising from the booking by the Maletics through lastminute.com of a package holiday organised by TUI. The Maletics booked and paid a package holiday to Egypt on the website of lastminute.com. According to the website, lastminute.com was acting as the travel agent and TUI was the travel operator. In the confirmation email, the hotel had not been the one booked by the Maletics who noticed the mistake on their arrival in Egypt and paid a surcharge to be able to stay in the hotel initially booked. The Maletics brought an action in Austria for the amount of the surcharge and compensation from the defendants jointly and severally. The court found that it had international jurisdiction to hear the case only as regards lastminute.com under Art 15(1)(c), but not as regards TUI on the ground that that situation was purely domestic and therefore Brussels I was not applicable. The court found that it also lacked local jurisdiction as regards TUI. The judgment became final. The Maletics brought an appeal before the referring court by arguing that the booking was a uniform legal transaction inseparably linked and the court had jurisdiction under Arts 15(3) and 16(1) as regards also TUI. TUI counter-argued that the dispute was based on two separable contracts. The referring court considered that since the purpose of Art 15 is to protect the weaker party, the consumer should be able to rely on Art 16(1) in the single booking transaction against the two contracting partners and asked the CJEU the interpretation of Art 16(1) in such a purely domestic situation. The CJEU observed that the main issue to determine was whether Brussels I was applicable to a contracting partner and whether there was an international element justifying its application. It analysed the issue in the light of Recitals to Brussels I, and its relevant case-law on both Brussels I and the Brussels Convention. By citing C-281/02, the CJEU reaffirmed that the international character of the legal relationship need not necessarily derive from the involvement, either because of the subject-matter of the proceedings or the respective domiciles of the parties, of a number of Contracting States. Thus, it found that Brussels I is applicable a fortiori to the case since the international element is present as regards both lastminute.com and TUI. The CJEU further observed that even assuming that the single transaction may be divided into two separate contractual relationships, the contractual relationship with TUI cannot be classified as ‘purely’ domestic since it was inseparably linked to the other contractual relationship made through the travel agency in another MS. The CJEU also considered the objectives of protecting the consumer as the weaker party (Recital 13) and of minimising the possibility of concurrent proceedings and accordingly irreconcilable judgments to be given (Recital 15). It observed that pursing parallel proceedings in Austria for the connected actions against two operators involved in the booking would not be consistent with these objectives. The CJEU thus held that the concept of ‘other party to the contract’ in Art 16(1) of Brussels I also covers the contracting partner of the operator with which the consumer concluded that contract and which has its registered office in the MS in which the consumer is domiciled. This was a correct interpretation of Art 16(1) and the CJEU gave its judgment fairly quickly in this case in less than 13 months.