Comm2 Reviewer — Part II-E: Air Transport and the Montreal Convention

PART 1 — SYLLABUS

1. Coverage Map

2. Learning Objectives

1. Place every air dispute in its regulatory frame by naming the Civil Aeronautics Board for economic terms and the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines for safety terms before touching liability.
2. State who the carrier is by running the Art. 1732 test of carriage for compensation with service to the public and by excluding mere agents, forwarders acting as agents, and travel arrangers.
3. Sort charter effects by asking who mans, victuals, and navigates the craft so that owner pro hac vice liability falls on the party with control.
4. Recite the sovereignty rule and the freedom ladder cold and explain why a foreign carrier needs permission for every commercial freedom and can never pick up purely domestic traffic.
5. Run the extraordinary diligence machine for passengers by pleading presumed fault under Art. 1756 and defeating it only with proof of utmost diligence under Arts. 1733 and 1755.
6. Apply the Air Passenger Bill of Rights thresholds from memory by separating the three-hour amenity rule from the six-hour deemed-cancellation rule and from the volunteer-first overbooking rule.
7. Walk any international death, baggage, cargo, or delay claim through the Montreal Convention by checking coverage first, then the liability trigger, then the cap and its exceptions, then notice, then prescription, then forum.
8. Draft a complete answer that concedes the exclusivity of the Convention where it applies and still collects what domestic law adds where the Convention is silent.

3. Authority Inventory

A. Cases

B. Laws & Rules

4. Three-Pass Study Plan

Why this order: the examiner grades provision-first answers, so the authority filter comes before doctrine. Then confusion pairs win marks because Part II-E questions punish merged ideas of delay with cancellation, checked with unchecked baggage, and domestic diligence with Convention caps.

5. Syllabus Self-Check

1. Which regulator fixes an airline tariff and which regulator grounds an unworthy aircraft. (§1)
2. What paper must a Philippine aircraft carry to prove nationality and why may an unregistered aircraft not engage in commercial carriage. (§1)
3. A travel agency books and tickets a tour but operates no aircraft. Is it a common carrier and what diligence does it owe. (§2)
4. A charterer mans and navigates the vessel while the owner only collects hire. Who answers to the injured passenger. (§2)
5. May a foreign airline sell tickets for the Manila to Cebu leg of its through flight. Which rule answers. (§3)
6. Name the five commercial freedoms in order and state which one cabotage refuses. (§3)
7. A confirmed passenger checks in one hour before departure with a valid ticket. May the airline bump her to free seats for late revenue standbys without asking volunteers first. (§4)
8. A flight is delayed four hours for a reason not attributable to the carrier. What must the airline give and what choice does the passenger hold. (§4)
9. The same delay reaches seven hours for a cause attributable to the carrier. What additional right vests beyond rebooking or refund. (§4)
10. Checked baggage arrives one day late and the airline tenders nothing. What sum per day does the Bill of Rights require. (§4)
11. A Manila to Tokyo ticket is bought in Manila. Is the carriage international under the Convention and why. (§5)
12. A passenger dies when turbulence throws her against the ceiling mid-flight. What must the family prove to recover the first tier and what must the airline prove to escape the second. (§5)
13. Checked baggage is lost and the passenger declared no higher value. What is the original-treaty cap and what fact lifts it. (§5)
14. Cargo arrives damaged and the carrier blames defective packing by the shipper. Which Convention article carries the defense and who bears the burden. (§5)

PART 2 — BOOK + AUTHORITY REVIEWER

0. One-Page Outline

Framing questions: what juridical relation binds the parties. What elements trigger liability. What exceptions and defenses defeat it. What remedy pays and what clock kills it. Mnemonic for original-treaty caps: 100 dead with 41 delayed with 10 bags with 17 per kilo, since Art. 21 gives 100,000 Special Drawing Rights for death, Art. 22 gives 4,150 for delay, 1,000 for baggage, and 17 per kilogram for cargo, all raised later by Article 24 inflation reviews.

1. Civil Aviation Laws and Regulatory Perspectives; Civil Aviation; Aircraft Registration

Republic Act No. 776, enacted in 1952 as the Civil Aeronautics Act, created the Civil Aeronautics Board and the licensing system for commercial air operations. No person may operate scheduled commercial air carriage without the required authority, and the Board fixes the economic terms on which airlines fly. Republic Act No. 9497, enacted in 2008 as the Civil Aviation Authority Act, created the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines and moved safety and technical regulation to that body. The division is therefore stable for examination: the Board governs routes, permits, tariffs, and consumer-facing economic terms while the Authority governs airworthiness, licensing of personnel, and operational safety.

Registration follows the nationality principle of the Chicago system. An aircraft has the nationality of the State where it is registered, it may be registered in only one State at a time, and it must carry proof of registration on board. Change of registry follows sale or transfer formalities, and military, customs, and police measures on board remain governed by the law of the flag subject to the territorial sovereignty of the State overflown.

Q: An investor buys a light aircraft abroad and starts selling seats on weekly Boracay runs without registering the aircraft and without any Board authority. A paying guest is hurt on landing and sues on carrier liability. How does the regulatory status affect the case?

A: The guest still sues a common carrier because Art. 1732 turns on holding out carriage for compensation to the public and not on possession of a permit. The lack of registration and of Board authority exposes the operator to administrative and criminal consequences and weakens every documentary defense the operator raises. The operator therefore answers under Arts. 1755 and 1756 with presumed fault while facing the regulators separately.

2. Air Transportation in General; Persons Involved; Charter of Aircraft

Art. 1732. Common carriers are persons, corporations, firms or associations engaged in the business of carrying or transporting passengers or goods or both, by land, water, or air, for compensation, offering their services to the public.

Air transportation is carriage by aircraft for compensation with service to the public. The airline is the carrier where it holds itself out on a route for all who pay. The consignor or shipper tenders cargo, the consignee receives it, and the passenger is the person carried. A travel agent that only arranges booking, ticketing, and accommodation operates no carriage business and is an agent, not a carrier. A freight forwarder that issues its own transport document answers as carrier, as Unsworth Transport International (Phils.), Inc. v. Court of Appeals (G.R. No. 166250, July 26, 2010) holds, while a broker with custody answers for goods in its hands, as Torres-Madrid Brokerage, Inc. v. FEB Mitsui Marine Insurance Co., Inc. (G.R. No. 194121, July 11, 2016) holds.

Case: Sps. Cruz v. Sun Holidays, Inc., G.R. No. 186312, June 29, 2010

Facts: Sun Holidays sold a package tour that included sea carriage of its guests, and a guest died in the course of the tour carriage.

Issue: The issue was whether a tour operator that carries its guests as part of the package answers as a common carrier.

Held: The Court treated the operator as a common carrier for the carriage leg and imposed death indemnity with earning capacity plus moral and exemplary damages.

Doctrine: One who undertakes to carry its guests for a price answers as a common carrier for that carriage even when carriage sits inside a wider tour package.

Case: Planters Products v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 101503, September 15, 1993

Facts: Bulk cargo moved under a charter arrangement and loss followed, raising the question of who stood as carrier.

Issue: The issue was whether the charter made the charterer the carrier or left the owner as carrier.

Held: The Court sorted liability by control, keeping the owner as carrier where the owner kept navigation and shifting it only on a true demise.

Doctrine: A demise charter transfers carrier character to the charterer as owner pro hac vice while a contract of affreightment leaves the owner as carrier.

2025 Bar Q: To celebrate her 70th birthday, A hired F Travel & Tours to arrange and facilitate her booking, ticketing, and accommodation for a two-week foreign tour, which included visits to Italy and Greece, for the total amount of PHP 145,000.00. On Wednesday, August 14, 2024, B, an employee of F Travel & Tours, went to A’s house to deliver the travel documents and plane ticket. She told A to be at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) on Saturday, August 17, 2024 two hours before her flight schedule. Without checking her travel documents, A went to NAIA on Saturday, August 17, 2024. When she got there, she was informed that the flight she was supposed to take had already left the previous day. A demanded that F Travel & Tours refund her payment. She claimed that F Travel & Tours did not observe the standard of care required of a common carrier when its employee, B, informed her of the wrong flight schedule. Is F Travel & Tours liable as a common carrier? Reason(s).

A: F Travel & Tours is not liable as a common carrier because it only arranged booking, ticketing, and accommodation and operated no aircraft or carriage business for the public under Art. 1732. A travel agency is an agent whose diligence is contractual agency care and not the extraordinary diligence of Arts. 1733 and 1755. A trip on the wrong date caused by the employee’s misinformation is tested under agency and fault rules with proof of actual loss and not under presumed carrier fault. The refund therefore depends on the agency contract and on proved negligence and not on common carrier liability.

2025 Bar Q: To celebrate her 30th birthday party, socialite A chartered for her exclusive use the yacht usually utilized by XYZ Resort to ferry its guests from the public port to its private island. A brought her own private crew to operate the yacht and invited 30 guests to her yacht party. While in the middle of the ocean, a sudden storm caused the yacht to capsize. While all the guests survived thanks to the prompt rescue operations of XYZ Resort, A succumbed to her injuries after hitting her head on floating debris and drowning. B, A’s father, sued XYZ Resorts for gross negligence, alleging that it failed to observe extraordinary diligence expected of common carriers. Is XYZ Resorts liable as a common carrier? Reason(s).

A: XYZ Resorts is not liable as a common carrier because A took the yacht for her exclusive use with her own private crew and full operational control, which is a demise that makes the charterer owner pro hac vice. The resort kept no navigation or command over the capsized voyage since A supplied the crew and ran her private party on board. The storm loss therefore cannot be laid on the resort’s extraordinary diligence as carrier, and B must anchor any claim on a different source of obligation with its own proof.

3. Sovereignty and Air Freedoms; Cancellation; Cabotage

Every State has complete and exclusive sovereignty over the airspace above its territory, and the Chicago Convention of 1944 builds the whole commercial system on that grant. No scheduled international air service may operate over or into the territory of another State without that State’s permission, and non-scheduled flights keep only a transit and non-traffic-stop privilege subject to conditions. Permission is rationed through the numbered freedoms of the air, and a State may withdraw or condition a grant where the carrier abuses it or where public interest requires.

Cabotage is the reservation of domestic carriage to national carriers. A foreign airline on a through flight may not sell the purely domestic sector, such as the Manila to Cebu leg, to local traffic. Cancellation of a commercial agreement or permit follows breach of conditions, abuse of the grant, or overriding safety and public-interest grounds, with due process before the Board.

Q: A foreign flag carrier flies Taipei to Manila to Cebu and offers cheap Manila to Cebu seats to fill the domestic hop. The Board stops the sale while letting the through flight continue. Is the Board correct?

A: The Board is correct because the Manila to Cebu leg is domestic traffic reserved by the cabotage rule even when flown as part of a foreign through service. The fifth and higher freedoms never include the right to carry purely local passengers between two domestic points without a domestic grant. The carrier keeps its transit and through rights but the domestic sale stays barred.

4. Extraordinary Diligence in Air; Tariff System; Baggage; Duty to Passenger; Denied Boarding; Air Passenger Bill of Rights; Inspection of Aircraft and Cargoes

Art. 1733. Common carriers, from the nature of their business and for reasons of public policy, are bound to observe extraordinary diligence in the vigilance over the goods and for the safety of the passengers transported by them, according to all the circumstances of each case.

Art. 1755. A common carrier is bound to carry the passengers safely as far as human care and foresight can provide, using the utmost diligence of very cautious persons, with a due regard for all the circumstances.

Art. 1756. In case of death of or injuries to passengers, common carriers are presumed to have been at fault or to have acted negligently, unless they prove that they observed extraordinary diligence as prescribed in Articles 1733 and 1755.

Airlines owe the same utmost diligence as every passenger carrier, applied to the special perils of flight. The duty covers ticket issuance, airworthiness of the aircraft, competent crewing, safe operation, and care of baggage. Issuance of a ticket perfects nothing substantive because the contract to carry is consensual: in British Airways v. Court of Appeals (G.R. No. 92288, February 9, 1993) the Court held that acceptance of prepaid fare perfects the contract and repeated bad-faith cancellations of confirmed bookings draw moral with exemplary damages. Airworthiness is non-delegable in the same way roadworthiness is on land, and an unairworthy dispatch defeats the diligence defense before fortuitous event is even reached.

The tariff system makes published fares part of the contract of carriage. The passenger pays the filed rate and the carrier collects no more, while discounts, surcharges, and baggage fees follow the approved tariff. The ticket or boarding pass must state the contract terms or point to where they are readily available, and online buyers must be told the terms before purchase is completed.

Denied boarding is fenced by the volunteer-first rule of the Air Passenger Bill of Rights. A checked-in passenger with a confirmed reserved seat has the right to board, and overbooking never justifies bumping without consent. The controlling section states the right in this wise:

A passenger checked in for a particular flight has the right to board the aircraft for the purpose of flight, except when there is legal or other valid cause.

Where overbooking strands confirmed passengers, the carrier must announce the overbooking, call for volunteers, and offer a menu that always includes priority booking on the next available flight or endorsement to another carrier with any fare difference paid, plus a cash incentive at the passenger option. The escalation rule is mandatory:

The air carrier shall increase the compensation package by certain degrees or by adding more amenities and services until the required number of volunteers is met.

Compensation accepted under the overbooking rule operates as liquidated damages for the lost confirmed seat. A passenger denied boarding for the passenger’s own fault, such as immigration inadmissibility or a safety and security ground, takes no relief under the same sections.

Cancellation and delay run on fixed thresholds. Cancellation attributable to the carrier gives notice with refreshments and meals, hotel with airport transport, free communication, first aid, and the passenger’s choice among reimbursement of the fare with taxes and surcharges, endorsement without fare difference, or rebooking without charge. Terminal delay of at least three hours, whether or not attributable to the carrier, gives refreshments or meals with free communication and first aid plus the right to rebook, refund, or be endorsed:

In case of terminal delay of at least three hours after the estimated time of departure, whether or not such delay is attributable to the carrier, a passenger shall have the right to refreshments or meals, free phone calls, text or electronic mail, and first aid, if necessary, and to rebook, refund, or be endorsed to another carrier.

Delay of at least six hours for causes attributable to the carrier is deemed a cancellation, adding compensation equivalent to at least the value of the sector delayed on top of the cancellation menu, with the right to board if the flight still departs and the passenger has not rebooked or refunded. Off-loaded checked baggage earns fixed inconvenience pay:

For every twenty-four hours of delay in delivery of off-loaded checked baggage, the air carrier shall tender Two Thousand Pesos (Php2,000.00) to the passenger as compensation for the inconvenience, and a fraction of a day counts as one day.

Inspection of aircraft and cargoes rests on customs, police, immigration, quarantine, and safety authority. The consignor furnishes the documents that formalities require and answers for damage caused by their absence, insufficiency, or irregularity unless carrier fault caused it, while the carrier need not warrant the correctness of papers tendered to it. Dangerous, misdeclared, or prohibited cargo may be refused, off-loaded, or held, and safety directives override carriage promises without carrier liability for the compliance itself.

Case: British Airways v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 92288, February 9, 1993

Facts: The airline accepted prepaid fares for groups of contract workers and then repeatedly failed to fly them on confirmed bookings, cancelling and rebooking flights without notice and forcing the recruiter to buy replacement tickets from other airlines.

Issue: The issue was whether a contract to carry existed without issued tickets and whether moral with exemplary damages could stand where actual damages failed for reimbursement.

Held: The Court held the consensual contract perfected on acceptance of the fare, deleted actual damages because the principal had reimbursed the expense, and kept moral with exemplary damages for evident bad faith.

Doctrine: Fare paid and accepted perfects the contract to carry without need of an issued ticket, and bad-faith breach of confirmed carriage pays moral with exemplary damages while reimbursed outlay pays no actual damages.

Q: A confirmed economy passenger checks in on time and the airline bumps her without asking for volunteers because the flight is overbooked. She accepts the next-day rebooking and signs a compensation receipt. May she still sue for moral damages for wounded feelings?

A: She may not recover beyond the receipt because compensation accepted under the overbooking rule operates as liquidated damages for the lost confirmed seat. The carrier breached the volunteer-first rule since no passenger with a confirmed seat may be bumped without consent before volunteers are sought with rising offers. Her signature on the compensation package therefore closes the seat-loss claim and leaves only relief outside that bargain if independently proved.

5. Montreal Convention 1999

The Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air was done at Montreal on May 28, 1999 to modernize and consolidate the Warsaw system and to protect consumers in international carriage with equitable compensation on a restitution basis. Its own preamble states the systemic purpose:

Recognizing the need to modernize and consolidate the Warsaw Convention and related instruments, and recognizing the importance of ensuring protection of the interests of consumers in international carriage by air and the need for equitable compensation based on the principle of restitution.

The Convention prevails over the Warsaw instruments wherever both bind the States concerned, and the Philippines applies it to international carriage by air. Constitutionality attacks on treaties of this kind fail where the Senate concurs and the obligations sit within the police power over common carriers, and the Convention leaves procedure to the forum while unifying substance.

Coverage turns on the agreement of the parties:

This Convention applies to all international carriage of persons, baggage or cargo performed by aircraft for reward. It applies equally to gratuitous carriage by aircraft performed by an air transport undertaking.

For the purposes of this Convention, the expression international carriage means any carriage in which, according to the agreement between the parties, the place of departure and the place of destination, whether or not there be a break in the carriage or a transhipment, are situated either within the territories of two States Parties, or within the territory of a single State Party if there is an agreed stopping place within the territory of another State, even if that State is not a State Party.

Carriage between two points inside one State Party with no agreed foreign stopping place is not international and stays under domestic law. State and military carriage for sovereign purposes may be reserved out, and postal carriage binds the carrier only toward the postal administration. Successive legs regarded as one operation keep one international character even where one contract runs wholly inside one State.

Duration fixes when Convention risk attaches. For passengers it is the accident window of embarking through disembarking. For cargo it is the whole period the goods sit in carrier charge, with loading, delivery, and transhipment surface legs presumed to be air carriage unless proved otherwise, and with unauthorized substitution of surface carriage deemed air carriage by law. The distinction matters because purely domestic surface legs outside an international contract never enter the Convention.

Documentation follows a light-touch rule. Passengers get an individual or collective document showing departure, destination, and any agreed foreign stopping place, plus a baggage tag per checked piece and written notice that the Convention governs and may limit liability. Cargo moves on an air waybill in three signed originals showing departure, destination, any agreed stopping place, and weight. Electronic records may substitute with a written statement or cargo receipt on request, and non-compliance never kills the contract since the Convention still governs including its limits.

Death and injury liability needs only an accident on board or in embarking or disembarking:

The carrier is liable for damage sustained in case of death or bodily injury of a passenger upon condition only that the accident which caused the death or injury took place on board the aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking.

Recovery then runs on two tiers. For damages up to 100,000 Special Drawing Rights per passenger the carrier can neither exclude nor limit liability, and above that figure the carrier escapes only by proving absence of its negligence or that a third party alone caused the harm. Article 24 compels five-year inflation reviews by the depositary, and each review that finds inflation above ten percent raises the figures, so the examinee states the treaty figure and checks the current revision before computing.

Baggage splits by custody. Checked baggage pays on destruction, loss, damage, or delay on proof that the event happened on board or while the bag sat in carrier charge, with inherent defect, quality, or vice as the only escape. Unchecked baggage including personal items pays only on carrier fault or the fault of servants or agents. Loss admitted or twenty-one days missing lets the passenger enforce the contract rights at once. The original-treaty baggage cap is 1,000 Special Drawing Rights per passenger unless a higher value was specially declared with any supplementary sum paid, and the cap breaks only on intent to cause damage or recklessness with knowledge that damage would probably result, committed within employment.

Cargo liability needs only an event during carriage by air, and the carrier escapes only by proving one of four defenses: inherent defect, quality, or vice; defective packing by someone other than the carrier or its servants or agents; act of war or armed conflict; or act of public authority connected with entry, exit, or transit. The original-treaty cargo cap is 17 Special Drawing Rights per kilogram unless a higher interest was specially declared with any supplementary sum paid, weighed only on the affected packages unless the damage depreciates companion packages under the same waybill. Delay of cargo answers under the same cap.

Delay anywhere in the system answers on one test:

The carrier is liable for damage occasioned by delay in the carriage by air of passengers, baggage or cargo. Nevertheless, the carrier shall not be liable for damage occasioned by delay if it proves that it and its servants and agents took all measures that could reasonably be required to avoid the damage or that it was impossible for it or them to take such measures.

The original-treaty delay cap is 4,150 Special Drawing Rights per passenger, broken only by intent or qualifying recklessness within employment.

Stipulation discipline runs both ways. A carrier may agree to higher limits or to no limits at all, and any clause that relieves the carrier or fixes a lower limit than the Convention is void without killing the contract. Freedom to contract survives for refusal of carriage, waiver of defenses, and consistent conditions. Contributory fault of the claimant wholly or partly exonerates the carrier to the extent the fault caused or contributed to the damage, and the same test reaches third-party claimants through the passenger’s own fault.

If the carrier proves that the damage was caused or contributed to by the negligence or other wrongful act or omission of the person claiming compensation, or the person from whom he or she derives his or her rights, the carrier shall be wholly or partly exonerated from its liability to the claimant to the extent that such negligence or wrongful act or omission caused or contributed to the damage.

Unrecoverable damages close the menu. The action lies however founded, whether under the Convention or in contract or in tort or otherwise, only under Convention conditions and limits, and punitive, exemplary, or any other non-compensatory damages are never recoverable in a Convention action. Moral damages as Philippine courts know them therefore stop at the Convention border.

In the carriage of passengers, baggage and cargo, any action for damages, however founded, whether under this Convention or in contract or in tort or otherwise, can only be brought subject to the conditions and such limits of liability as are set out in this Convention. In any such action, punitive, exemplary or any other non-compensatory damages shall not be recoverable.

Jurisdiction gives the plaintiff five doors with the fifth for death and injury only: domicile of the carrier, principal place of business, place of business through which the contract was made, place of destination, and the passenger’s principal and permanent residence where the carrier operates services there on its own or by commercial agreement from leased or owned premises. Procedure follows the forum seized. Cargo disputes may go to arbitration in writing at a Convention forum at the claimant’s choice with Convention substance applied.

Notice is a condition of suit except on carrier fraud. Damage complaints go in writing forthwith and at the latest within seven days of receipt for checked baggage and fourteen days for cargo, while delay complaints go within twenty-one days from when baggage or cargo was placed at disposal. Clean receipt without complaint is prima facie evidence of good delivery. Prescription extinguishes the right where no action is brought within two years from arrival, from when the aircraft ought to have arrived, or from when carriage stopped, with the forum fixing the computation method.

Successive carriage makes each carrier that accepts passengers, baggage, or cargo subject to the Convention for the leg under its supervision. The passenger sues only the carrier that performed the leg of accident or delay unless the first carrier assumed the whole journey, while baggage and cargo claimants reach the first carrier, the last carrier, and the leg carrier jointly and severally. Contracting-carrier against actual-carrier rules add a second layer: both answer under the Convention, the former for the whole contemplated carriage and the latter for what it performed, with each one’s servants imputed to the other and aggregate recovery capped at the highest awardable amount without exceeding any one person’s applicable limit. Servants and agents acting within employment invoke the same conditions and limits, and their qualifying intentional or reckless acts forfeit the limits for non-cargo claims.

Board limits sit under the Convention and never above it. The Civil Aeronautics Board may police tariffs and consumer terms on domestic sectors, but on Convention carriage its figures yield to treaty caps and exclusivity. Tort liability survives only inside the Convention frame since the exclusivity rule channels every action however founded through Convention conditions and limits, which is why exemplary damages pleaded in tort still fail on Convention carriage.

Q: A Manila to Singapore passenger checks through with one ticket and her checked bag never arrives. She declares no higher value and writes a complaint on the tenth day after arrival. The bag is still missing on the twenty-fifth day. What may she collect and is her complaint timely?

A: She collects up to 1,000 Special Drawing Rights under the original-treaty baggage cap since she declared no higher value and proved no intent or qualifying recklessness. Her written complaint on the tenth day misses the seven-day baggage damage rule, so the carrier invokes the time bar unless it committed fraud. The twenty-one-day loss rule lets her enforce the contract rights for a missing bag, but the late damage notice still defeats the claim where fraud is absent.

Q: Cargo flies Manila to Osaka and arrives water-damaged. The carrier proves the shipper packed the crate defectively and its own handlers did nothing wrong. The consignee sues on the third year after arrival. What is the outcome?

A: The carrier wins on the defense since defective packing by a person other than the carrier or its servants or agents exonerates it to the extent proved. The suit also arrives dead because the two-year extinction under Art. 35 runs from arrival and the forum computation cannot revive an extinguished right. The consignee therefore collects nothing under the Convention and domestic tort cannot reopen what exclusivity closed.

Quick-Recall Tables

Exam Traps

1. A travel agency is an agent and never a carrier, so agency diligence and not Art. 1755 grades its misinformation.
2. A forwarder with its own bill is a carrier while a forwarder acting only as agent stays an agent, and the document decides.
3. Control decides charter character, since a demise shifts carrier status to the charterer and affreightment keeps it with the owner.
4. Sovereignty means permission precedes service, so every commercial freedom needs its own grant.
5. Cabotage refuses the domestic leg even on a foreign through flight, so the Manila to Cebu sale stays barred.
6. The contract to carry is consensual, so fare paid and accepted binds without any issued ticket.
7. Presumed fault follows death or injury of passengers, so the airline proves utmost diligence or pays.
8. Airworthiness is non-delegable, so an unairworthy dispatch kills the diligence defense first.
9. The tariff binds both sides, so neither side rewrites the filed rate at the gate.
10. No confirmed passenger is bumped without consent, since volunteers with rising offers come first.
11. Accepted overbooking pay is liquidated, so the seat-loss claim closes on the receipt.
12. Three hours gives amenities with a rebook, refund, or endorse choice even where the carrier is blameless.
13. Six hours attributable to the carrier is deemed cancellation with sector-value compensation on top.
14. Off-loaded baggage earns Php2,000.00 per day with fractions counting whole, so the tender is ministerial.
15. No agreed foreign stopping place means no Convention, so domestic diligence with the Bill of Rights governs.
16. The accident window decides death claims, so harm outside embarking through disembarking fails Art. 17.
17. Inherent vice defeats checked baggage claims while fault decides unchecked ones, so custody class comes first.
18. Defective packing by others, war, public authority acts, and inherent vice are the only cargo escapes, and the carrier proves them.
19. Delay pays unless all reasonable measures were taken or were impossible, and the carrier carries that proof.
20. Lower limits are void while higher limits are valid, so stipulation discipline runs one way against the carrier.
21. Contributory fault exonerates wholly or partly to its causal share, so the claimant’s own negligence is always pleaded.
22. Punitive and exemplary damages never survive a Convention action, so tort pleading cannot smuggle them in.
23. Seven days governs baggage damage notice with fourteen for cargo and twenty-one for delay, all in writing.
24. Two years from arrival or ought-to-have-arrived extinguishes the right, so prescription is extinction and not a technicality.
25. Five forums serve death claims while four serve the rest, and procedure follows the court seized.
26. The leg carrier answers in successive carriage while the first answers only where it assumed the whole journey.

Key Authorities Cited

Codes: Civil Code Arts. 1732-1735, 1755-1756, and 1763 with the Warsaw system background carried from the Convention preamble.

Special laws and regulations: R.A. No. 776 of 1952 creating the Civil Aeronautics Board, R.A. No. 9497 of 2008 creating the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, the Chicago Convention of 1944 on sovereignty and freedoms, the Montreal Convention of 1999 with its Article 24 revision mechanism, and DOTC-DTI Joint Administrative Order No. 1, s. 2012 effective December 21, 2012.

Cases: G.R. No. 92288 (1993), G.R. No. 186312 (2010), G.R. No. 101503 (1993), G.R. No. 194121 (2016), G.R. No. 166250 (2010), and G.R. No. 145804 (2003), with 2025 Bar Q7 and 2025 Bar Q16 as the historic questions.

Source and Verification Note

Scope follows the syllabus Part II-E slice with the table of contents of Aquino 2024 Chapters 11 and 12 in exact order. The Aquino textbook file on this machine is a scanned-image portable document whose pages yield no extractable text, the same finding recorded for Parts II-A through II-D, so chapter substance was rebuilt from the controlling provisions with the six air-relevant assigned Batch 2 digests and the Batch 2 Case List rather than from verbatim book prose. Civil Code quotations were read from the ChanRobles full-text capture of Republic Act No. 386, confirming Arts. 1732, 1733, 1755, and 1756 word for word with Art. 1735 cross-checked on the same capture. Montreal Convention quotations were read from the International Air Transport Association full-text capture of the Convention, confirming the preamble purpose lines with Arts. 1, 3 to 5, 9 to 13, 16 to 22, 24 to 26, 29 to 31, 33, 35, 36, and 39 to 44, and the liability figures stated are the original-treaty figures of 100,000, 4,150, 1,000, and 17 Special Drawing Rights with Article 24 inflation reviews noted as the moving current source. Air Passenger Bill of Rights quotations were read from the LabanPH mirror of Joint Administrative Order No. 1, s. 2012 cross-checked against the Civil Aeronautics Board briefer since the Official Gazette page sits behind verification, confirming the boarding right, the volunteer escalation rule, the three-hour and six-hour delay rules, and the Php2,000.00 off-loaded baggage rule. The 2025 Bar Q7 stem on F Travel and Tours and the 2025 Bar Q16 stem on the chartered yacht are verbatim from the Bar Questions compilation, and no verbatim Montreal Convention, denied-boarding, or tariff question exists in the 2016 to 2025 bank, so remaining drills are drafted without years. Case citations and dates come from the Batch 2 Case List with consolidated dockets reduced to the first number. Amendatory and related laws are dated in text, namely the Chicago Convention of 1944, the Civil Aeronautics Act as R.A. No. 776 of 1952, the Civil Code of 1950, the Civil Aviation Authority Act as R.A. No. 9497 of 2008, the Air Passenger Bill of Rights as 2012 regulation, and the Montreal Convention adopted in 1999. No invented statute, docket, or holding is asserted.