§ 23. When the organiser can cancel the package holiday
Machine-translated from Norwegian. The Norwegian text is the one that applies. Read the original in Norwegian.Norsk English العربية Polski Українська
In brief
- The organiser (arrangør) can cancel if too few people have signed up, but must give notice within the deadline in the contract and no later than 20 days, seven days or 48 hours before, depending on the length of the trip.
- The organiser can also cancel in the event of unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances (uunngåelige og ekstraordinære omstendigheter), with notice given without undue delay.
- You are not entitled to compensation (erstatning) for such a cancellation by the organiser (avlysning), but you get back what you have paid.
The text of the law (unofficial translation)
§ 23. Cancellation of the package holiday by the organiser
- 20 days before the start of the package holiday in the case of trips lasting more than 6 days
- 7 days before the start of the package holiday in the case of trips lasting between 2 and 6 days
- 48 hours before the start of the package holiday in the case of trips lasting less than 2 days.
What does this mean?
This section gives the organiser the right to cancel the package holiday in two situations. Both require that the traveller is notified, but the deadlines are different.
The first situation is that too few people have signed up. The contract must state a minimum number, and the number of people signed up must be below it. The organiser must give notice within the deadline in the contract, and never later than the outer deadlines in the law. For trips of more than six days, the outer deadline is 20 days before departure. For trips of two to six days, it is seven days before. For trips of less than two days, it is 48 hours before.
The second situation is that the trip cannot be carried out because of unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances. In that case, the traveller must be notified without undue delay. There is no fixed number of days here.
In both situations, the traveller is not entitled to compensation for the cancellation by the organiser. The traveller is nevertheless entitled to get back everything that has been paid.
This section is the organiser's counterpart to the rules on cancellation by the traveller (avbestilling). § 21 gives the traveller the right to cancel for a fee (gebyr), and § 22 gives the right to cancel without a fee in extraordinary circumstances. In the event of cancellation by the organiser, the organiser must, under § 24, pay back everything that has been paid, no later than 14 days after the contract ended.
Example: The contract requires a minimum number of participants, and fewer than that sign up. The trip lasts more than six days. The organiser must then notify the traveller within the deadline in the contract, and no later than 20 days before departure. The notice arrives in time, and the traveller gets the money back, but not compensation.