Travel agency contracts in Spain: what you need signed before selling your first trip

Opening a travel agency in Spain (online or brick-and-mortar) has a peculiarity: a large part of your contract with the customer is written by the law, not by you. With wholesalers, hotels and airlines it is the opposite: almost everything depends on what you sign. This guide orders both fronts, plus the administrative one.

Organiser, retailer or facilitator: the qualification that decides everything

If you combine at least two types of travel services (transport, accommodation, car rental or other significant tourist services) for the same trip, you are selling a package (art. 151 TRLGDCU), whether you assemble it yourself or let the customer pick the pieces before paying a single price. The one who assembles is the organiser; the one who sells, the retailer. Facilitating stand-alone services or linked travel arrangements carries a lighter regime, but linked arrangements still require insolvency protection and specific information. The classic trap is a website that lets customers build flight plus hotel in one checkout and believes it is "just reselling third-party services": that is a package, with the full regime attached.

The contract with the traveller

Pre-contractual information must be delivered through standardised forms before the traveller is bound (art. 153 TRLGDCU) and becomes part of the contract. Price increases are only possible if the contract expressly allows them (and mirrors decreases), only for fuel, taxes or exchange-rate variations, never in the 20 days before departure; above 8% of the total price, the traveller may terminate without penalty (art. 158). The traveller can withdraw at any time before departure against a reasonable standardised fee or the actual justified costs, and terminates free of charge where unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances at destination significantly affect the trip (art. 160). Clauses cutting back these rights are void.

Liability and guarantees

Under art. 161 TRLGDCU, organiser and retailer answer jointly and severally to the traveller for the performance of all services in the package, regardless of who must perform them, with a right of recourse between them. That is why your wholesale contract must expressly regulate recourse, claims handling and insurance. Before operating you also need the regional tourism authorisation (usually a responsible declaration plus a bond, varying by region) and the insolvency guarantee of art. 164 TRLGDCU covering refunds and repatriation, which is not the same as your liability insurance.

Suppliers and the digital layer

With wholesalers, hotels, airlines and bed banks, negotiate allotments and release dates, payment and deposits, mirrored cancellation terms and recourse. If your relationship with an operator amounts to a genuine agency under Law 12/1992, mandatory rules apply, including goodwill compensation up to the annual average of the last five years' remuneration (art. 28) — qualification follows the substance of the relationship, not the document's title. Selling online adds the Spanish Information Society Act (LSSI), the full set of website legal texts, and GDPR: processor agreements (art. 28 GDPR), passports and, on some trips, health or mobility data, which are special categories under art. 9 GDPR.

Frequently asked questions

Is a flight-plus-hotel bundle I assemble a package?

Generally yes: combining at least two types of travel services for the same trip, sold at an inclusive price or within one booking process, is a package under art. 151 TRLGDCU, even if third parties perform the services.

Can I charge cancellation fees if the traveller withdraws?

Yes: a reasonable standardised fee set in the contract or the actual justified costs. The exception is unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances at destination significantly affecting the trip, where the traveller terminates without penalty and with a refund (art. 160 TRLGDCU).

Setting up an agency or renegotiating with wholesalers? Our commercial contracts team reviews what you are, what you sign upstream and what you promise downstream, so the three tell the same story.