{"id":330488,"date":"2026-05-07T03:13:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T21:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/?p=330488"},"modified":"2026-05-07T03:13:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T21:43:15","slug":"german-tourist-sues-tour-operator-after-losing-6am-race-to-order-sunbed-news-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/2026\/05\/07\/german-tourist-sues-tour-operator-after-losing-6am-race-to-order-sunbed-news-world\/","title":{"rendered":"German tourist sues tour operator after losing 6am race to order sunbed | News World"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<figure class=\"img-container shareable-item wp-caption\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\">\n\t\t\t<\/div><figcaption>Tourists often get up early to stake their claim to a sunbed (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>If there&#8217;s one topic that may divide Europe like no other it&#8217;s the annual sunbed wars that grip beach resorts every summer.<\/p>\n<p>Tourists get up on the daybreak and wait for the gates to the hotel pool to open, before making a mad dash to order a lounger with a towel.<\/p>\n<p>Now one German dad has successfully sued his tour operator because he kept on losing the battle for a sunbed.<\/p>\n<p>The unnamed man had spent \u00a36,200 on a vacation along with his wife and two children to the Greek island of Kos in August 2024.<\/p>\n<p>He thought he wouldn&#8217;t should stress about reserving a spot within the sun since the hotel had an explicit rule banning loungers with towels.<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless a district court in Hanover heard how the family\u2019s mornings became a rush for pool space, with guests ignoring the ban in practice.<\/p>\n<div class=\"factbox\" data-ico=\"factbox_article\" data-track-module=\"factbox_article\">\n<h2 class=\"factbox-title\">\n\t\t\t\tJoin for all of the newest stories\t\t\t<\/h2>\n<div class=\"factbox-content\">\n<p>Start your day informed with Metro&#8217;s <strong>News Updates<\/strong> newsletter or get <strong>Breaking News <\/strong>alerts the moment it happens. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<figure class=\"img-container shareable-item wp-caption\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\">\n\t\t<img width=\"646\" height=\"363\" src=\"https:\/\/metro.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/SEI_296049841-847e.jpg?quality=90&#038;strip=all&#038;w=646\" class=\"article-image wp-image-28263145\" alt=\"Tigaki or Tigkaki beach, very long and beautiful sandy beach on the island of Kos. Greece\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\">\t<\/div><figcaption>The German man wanted a calming holiday in Kos without stressing about loungers (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The dad said that even after they got up at 6am, many of the sun beds had already been nabbed by other guests.<\/p>\n<p>He complained to the court that the situation was so dire the family spent as much as 20 minutes every day trying to seek out a spot they may all sit togehter,<\/p>\n<p>The youngsters were sometimes left lying on the ground due to lack of loungers, he said.<\/p>\n<p>The German man claimed hotel staff refused to step in to assist.<\/p>\n<p>The tour operator \u2013 which was not named in proceedings \u2013 previously offered \u00a3300 to the family in compensation.<\/p>\n<p>However the court sided with the holidaymaker and ruled he was entitled to a partial refused of \u00a3850.<\/p>\n<p>The court ruled the package holiday had been \u2018defective\u2019 since it had not provided the \u2018character\u2019 that the shopper was contractually entitled to expect.<\/p>\n<p>The ruling acknowledged that the travel company didn&#8217;t operate the hotel itself so couldn&#8217;t guarantee sunbed access.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"img-container shareable-item wp-caption\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\">\n\t\t<img width=\"646\" height=\"380\" src=\"https:\/\/metro.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/SEI_296049691-be01.jpg?quality=90&#038;strip=all&#038;w=646\" class=\"article-image wp-image-28263142\" alt=\"Reserving sunbeds by the pool by putting down towels.\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\">\t<\/div><figcaption>The family said they spent 20 minutes trying to find sunbeds they may all sit on together (Picture: Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Nonetheless the judges said the operator still had an obligation to make sure there was a structure in place that meant a \u2018reasonable\u2019 ratio of loungers available.<\/p>\n<p>Germans actually dislike the annual sunbed wars, despite the stereotype as one of the crucial dogged participants.<\/p>\n<p>One poll showed that as many as 66 per cent of them opposed it and 14 per cent had even removed offending towels.<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless a survey of German tourists last summer revealed that 71 per cent of them thought it was a \u2018predominantly German\u2019 custom.<\/p>\n<p>British holidaymakers thought that the most important culprits were fellow Brits, a special survey showed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong><strong><strong>Get in contact with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong>For more stories like this, <\/strong><strong>check our news page<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"><\/use><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Recent train launched links two of Europe\u2019s coolest capitals \u2014 with tickets from \u00a353<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"><\/use><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Manchester Airport gets two first-ever routes to lush Greek island and Africa\u2019s largest country<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"><\/use><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Two dead and at the least 20 injured after automobile ploughs into crowd in German city<\/span><\/p>\n<section id=\"share-buttons-bottom\" class=\"share-buttons share-buttons-bottom\"><a class=\"metro-button share-bar-comments\" data-vars-position=\"bottom\" href=\"#metro-comments-container\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t<span><svg><title>Comment now<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#social-comment\" href=\"#social-comment\"><\/use><\/svg><\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"share-bar-comments__label\">Comments<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t<\/a><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<span><svg><title>Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#social-preferred-source\" href=\"#social-preferred-source\"><\/use><\/svg><\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"share-bar-preferred-source__label\">Add as preferred source<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t<\/section>\n<div class=\"newsletter-end-card accent--news\">\n<div class=\"newsletter-end-card__inner\">\n<h4>News Updates<\/h4>\n<p>Stay on top of the headlines with every day email updates.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tourists often get up early to stake their claim to a sunbed (Picture: Getty Images) If there&#8217;s one topic that may divide Europe like no other it&#8217;s the annual sunbed wars that grip beach resorts every summer. Tourists get up on the daybreak and wait for the gates to the hotel pool to open, before [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":330489,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20691],"tags":[51419,4449,5065,395,7148,997,20039,1951,32747,2112,14584,813],"class_list":["post-330488","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world","tag-6am","tag-german","tag-losing","tag-news","tag-operator","tag-race","tag-reserve","tag-sues","tag-sunbed","tag-tour","tag-tourist","tag-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330488","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330488"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330488\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":330491,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330488\/revisions\/330491"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}