The EU's new rules also aim to toughen protections for travelers in the event of bankruptcy of a travel vendor | Sergei Supinsky/AFP via Getty Images New EU package-holiday protections take hold The EU is making an appeal to consumers in time for summer holidays.

What good is free cell phone roaming if you get ripped off on your holiday plans and never get to travel?

In what might be viewed as a nice corollary to "roam-like-at-home" — arguably the European Commission's most mass-appeal deliverable in recent years — strengthened EU consumer rules to protect travelers take effect on July 1, just in time for the peak summer travel season.

Unlike ending cell phone roaming charges, which was break-through policy, the new rules are an update to existing rules called the EU Package Travel Directive, which the Commission said had become outdated and are enforced at the national level.

Among other changes, the revisions expand the EU's definition of a travel "package" to include not only fully pre-packaged tours purchased from single tour operators, but also combinations of flights and hotels that travelers combine on their own while booking online. Under the new rules, an airline selling flights and hotel accommodations on its site would be subject to the same rules as a tour operator selling the same combination.

The EU's new rules also aim to toughen protections for travelers in the event of bankruptcy of a travel vendor, including an expansion of when repatriation costs must be covered by airlines. The rules add new specificity to provisions that allow travelers to cancel and demand a refund in the event that a tour operator seeks to impose price increases because of changes in market conditions, such as increased fuel or energy costs, or increases of taxes and fees.

Under the new rules, travelers will be entitled to cancel with a refund if the proposed price increase amounts to 8 percent more of the original cost. The rules also state that such potential increases can only be built into tour-package contracts if there are also mirroring provisions allowing for a decrease in prices should opposite conditions occur, such as a decline in fuel prices.

As an EU “directive” rather than “regulation,” the new rules will be implemented according to national taste, meaning there is no single system for claiming your new rights.

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