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Costa's safety record isn't the only thing that should frighten passengers, say Walker and other legal experts. Also worrisome are the flimsy legal rights passengers have when they book a cruise, outlined in a legal document known as the ticket contract, which is available on the cruise line's website and is normally included with your ticket.
For passengers with future cruise plans, the contract delivers some bad news: If you want a refund, and you're within two weeks of departing on a European cruise, you're out of luck. (If it's anywhere between 44 and 15 days until your vacation, you can get half your money back.)
The contract is equally restrictive as it applies to the Concordia's survivors. The fine print limits the cruise line's liability to about $71,000 per passenger, requires that any claim against the company be filed within a year, restricts the filing venue to a court in Genoa, Italy, and applies Italian law to resolving the dispute.
For cruises from U.S. ports, Costa's contract limits the venue for filing lawsuits to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, effectively turning any lawsuit into a costly federal case. Other ticket language prevents smaller complaints from being brought together as class actions, further limiting passengers' access to justice, say legal experts.
Cruise line claims adjusters often send a series of letters to injured survivors, asking for more information. The time required for correspondence and documentation runs down the clock on any claims, according to David Deehl, an adjunct law professor at the University of Miami and the vice chairman of the American Bar Association's Admiralty and Maritime Law Committee."They're appearing to want to settle, asking for more and more information," he says. In fact, they're usually intent on paying the least they can under the law.
One place where cruise lines move quickly is in shoring up their own defense, Deehl notes. "They have their own civil defense lawyers who are often flown right to the ship to interview crew and passengers immediately, locking in their defense theories with sworn testimony," he told me."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/travel/sns-201201240000--tms--traveltrctntt-b20120124jan24,0,2392511.story
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