Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by nehalem on Friday September 02, 2022 @02:33AM
(#32687296)
Allowing punitive damages would be a major change to the foundations of German civil law. German law (mostly and traditionally) thinks of damages as a means to make the other party whole rather than to incentivise a certain behaviour of the injurer. Hence German law is utmost reluctant to give anyone more than they suffered in losses.
Adding some obscure consumer protection rule is a much less controversial change to the law.
The traditional German legal doctrine sees the enforcement of fair business practices rather in the hands of the authorities than in those of consumers. Of course, there is little evidence of this to work in this or similar contexts.
Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by ginko on Friday September 02, 2022 @02:45AM
(#32687379)
> Allowing punitive damages would be a major change to the foundations of German civil law.
There ARE punitive damages the airline has to pay you if they cancel or delay your flight. It's EU law. See the sibling comment.
For instance if they cancel or delay a flight over 1500 km in the EU you're entitled to 400 Euro compensation on top of cost of ticket and other expenses you had due to it.
Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by hnaccount_rng on Friday September 02, 2022 @05:02AM
(#32688418)
That's not punitive though. That's to compensate the traveler for caused inconvenience. It also happens to work as some form of punishment yes, but it's by far not high enough to work as a deterrence.
Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by nehalem on Friday September 02, 2022 @02:59AM
(#32687493)
You are correct that the provisions of EU law can be construed as punitive damages. That’s why I emphasised the German legal tradition. Also, those damages do not apply in all possible situations of cancelled flights and they do not punish withholding refunds for no reason. If the airline cancels three weeks prior and then refuses to pay, the EU law does not apply and the behaviour we would like to disincentivise is not to honour the refund claims rather than the cancellation.
Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by Dylan16807 on Friday September 02, 2022 @02:51AM
(#32687431)
> German law (mostly and traditionally) thinks of damages as a means to make the other party whole rather than to incentivise a certain behaviour of the injurer.
Does that include payment for time spent seeking a verdict?
Re:Germany pushes for ‘pay as you fly’ model
by Arnt on Friday September 02, 2022 @03:54AM
(#32687898)
Often but not invariably.
Maybe if they want to change the laws anyway, this is what they should fix instead. In particular, there should be punitive damages for everything illegal that are high enough that it's almost never profitable to break the law even if you get away with it a significant proportion of the time.