According to the Office of National Statistics an estimated 3.8 million UK residents travelled to Europe in March 2019, the lion's share will be on holiday; one in 20 tourists have an accident whilst abroad. Accidents whilst on holiday range from a minor inconvenience to a catastrophic life-changing disaster and largely, they are totally unexpected. In the vast majority of incidents, the injured party bears no responsibility for their own accident. It is therefore only reasonable for a person who is injured through no fault of their own should be adequately compensated for the accident. There are a vast number of complicated factors that surround and affect the prospects of successfully obtaining compensation for your accident.
Tourists have a varying view as to who should assist them should the worst happen and they have a serious accident during the course of their holiday; roughly three quarters of travellers expect help from their tour operator and believe that they offer support with emergency travel arrangement, medical help, advice with insurance and assistance with contacting relatives, whilst 16% of tourists expect no such help from their tour operator with any of the previously listed items. The obligatory assistance that tour operators must give their client is outlined in the recently revised Travel Package Directive which has been operative since 2018 and does, in fact, indicate that tour operators do have a duty to assist in accordance with the majority of the tourists expectations but crucially only if the injury occurs during an activity or in a place in which they, the tour operators, were involved in its organisation. Anecdotally, injured holidaymakers testify that the assistance they receive often falls short of the responsibilities defined in the Travel Package Directive.
Liability can often hard to discern. There are a vast number of complicated factors that surround and affect the prospects of successfully obtaining compensation for your accident.
It is strongly recommended that you obtain good quality legal assistance as soon as possible. Not the least because the opportunity to claim compensation for your accident will have time limitations for filing a claim. Time limitations vary country to country and if you miss the deadline for filing such a claim it cannot be overridden and you will have missed your chance. The time limitations are governed by the country in which you had the accident, the type of accident and how you booked your holiday; the time limitations vary from one year to five years depending on the previously mentioned factors. In the event of a serious accident where the injured party has a long period of recovery, it is easy to overlook the fact that in order to obtain the compensation you deserve you should begin a legal action as soon as possible. The experienced personal injury lawyers at Giambrone are very familiar with the types of defence typically put up by organisations such as hotels, leisure centres and water parks to avoid accepting liability for an accident and can easily counter the arguments.
Personal injury claims are particularly prone to tactics such as procrastination, expanding the time taken to reply bringing the matter close to being struck out due to the time limitations which can be very stressful for the injured person and their family, which makes it even more imperative to obtain legal advice from lawyers with a clear understanding of the law and culture of the country in which you had your accident to have the best chance of success.
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The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
