Canadian mom slams Air Canada for rebooking her on 15-hour itinerary amid strike
A Canadian woman said she is missing critical appointments in the United States due to Air Canada’s strike flight cancellations.
Sarah* had booked a flight with Air Canada for Wednesday, Aug. 20, at 12:40 a.m. from Vancouver to Washington, D.C. She needed to be at a bank meeting that morning to obtain documents that she needed to provide at an appointment with the Embassy of Iran on Thursday, Aug. 21, at 8 a.m. EDT.
The meeting would have helped her get her father, who has Alzheimer’s, back home safely to Vancouver and away from the conflict between Iran and Israel. She said he travelled to Iran earlier this year, not knowing what was about to happen.
“My dad is a permanent resident [of Canada], and we’re trying to bring him back. While he was there, he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, so he’s forgetting our names,” Sarah told Daily Hive over the phone. “We have to get our dad here, ASAP.”
The Embassy of Iran in Ottawa is permanently closed, so she had no choice but to go to the closest one in Washington.
Air Canada rebooks her on a “completely unsuitable itinerary” amid the strike
Vancouver International Airport on Saturday, Aug. 16, amid the Air Canada flight attendants’ strike. (Harrison Ha/Shutterstock)
Sarah, who is a frequent flyer and Aeroplan 75K status member, booked her business class seat with Air Canada in July. She said she panicked when the airline announced the flight cancellations in anticipation of the strike, so she called their priority phone line.
Sarah recounted the agent telling her not to cancel her flight, but to instead wait for Air Canada to cancel it, and then to call them back for a full refund and alternative travel options.
She said an agent told her on Monday, Aug. 18, that the airline could soon be fully operating again and to not cancel her flight. That night, she received the inevitable flight cancellation email from the carrier, but when she called back, Sarah waited over two hours without reaching an agent.
Air Canada sent Sarah a flight cancellation notification over email. (Supplied)
While she was waiting on the phone, she received an email from Air Canada, which automatically rebooked her on what she called a “completely unsuitable itinerary.”
The new flight with Alaska Airlines left on Wednesday at 9:45 p.m. EDT, 10 hours after her original departure, and would arrive in D.C. on Thursday at 4 p.m. EDT, meaning she would miss all of her important appointments.
On top of that, the new itinerary was over 15 hours long and included a layover in Portland, Oregon, lasting more than eight hours. Sarah said it would have been especially difficult as she’s a new mom travelling alone with her four-month-old baby.
She added that she was downgraded from business class to economy, despite having used 88,000 Aeroplan points (equivalent to $2,000) to book the premium seat.
Air Canada rebooked Sarah on a 15-hour-long itinerary. (Supplied)
In its initial 72-hour lockout notice, Air Canada told customers that they would be notified of alternative travel options.
“However, given other carriers are already very full due to the summer travel peak, securing such capacity will take time and, in many cases, will not be immediately possible,” the carrier added as a disclaimer.
According to Canada’s Air Passenger Protection Regulations, when the delay or cancellation is outside of an airline’s control, the carrier is legally obligated to rebook the passenger for free on the next available flight operated by any carrier, on any reasonable air route from the airport where you’re located, or another airport within a reasonable distance. The flight must also leave within 48 hours of the original departure time on the original ticket.
While Sarah’s new itinerary was within 48 hours of her original departure, she was still “deeply frustrated” because it wasn’t necessarily the next available flight.
She said she found other earlier flights that would get her to D.C. in time for her appointments without a brutal eight-hour layover, and added that the agent in her initial call even showed her an earlier flight with WestJet. However, Air Canada’s system still automatically booked her on a later, more inconvenient flight.
“It felt like Air Canada deliberately stuck me with an impossible itinerary to avoid offering better options,” she told Daily Hive. “They just [rebooked me], just so that they can wash their hands and say, ‘Well, we booked you on one.'”
Sarah said she then cancelled the new itinerary under the promise of a full refund. According to the mom, Air Canada reimbursed her points, but made her pay $150.28 for the cancellation. She added that she paid $180 in cash for a portion of the original ticket, but was only reimbursed $32.
“If airlines expect loyalty, they need to act like it matters”
More than 10,000 Air Canada flight attendants began their strike on Saturday, Aug. 16. (Harrison Ha/Shutterstock)
On Tuesday, the airline and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), which represents thousands of flight attendants at Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge, reached a tentative deal that will begin paying flight attendants for the work they do on the ground before the plane takes off.
Air Canada gradually began resuming services on Tuesday, ramping up their flights on Wednesday. Its site details what passengers can do if they have a flight in the upcoming days. The carrier is also offering refund assistance for customers affected by the strike-related cancellations.
Sarah said she’s looking for alternative routes, but all the flights are now double the price.
“If I were to get that exact same ticket right now, I’m spending 150,000 points. So now I’m going to be paying five grand,” she explained. “I’m on maternity leave. I have a four-month-old baby; there’s only so much money I can spend to be able to travel with my kid.”
The mom of two added that her other child is heading back to school in September, so she’s only available the last two weeks of August to travel to the embassy.
On Wednesday morning, she told Daily Hive that she still hasn’t been able to reach an Air Canada agent. Sarah said she wonders whether being a loyal customer with the airline is worth it.
“The 75K status line is now useless, making it nearly impossible to get help when it matters,” she said. “[Air Canada] is adding so much f**king anxiety to everybody’s life. This is unacceptable.”
Besides the emotional toll this has taken on Sarah, there’s also the financial price that she has had to pay. In addition to the cancellation fee and not being fully reimbursed for the cash portion of her original ticket, the mom is also out $497 for their non-refundable hotel booking.
“This experience was exhausting, stressful, and avoidable. If airlines expect loyalty, they need to act like it matters. Right now, Air Canada is doing the opposite,” she said.
Air Canada has yet to reply to Daily Hive’s request for comment.
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*A pseudonym was used to maintain anonymity.