As for pricing, my experience is that all advertised flight pass prices INCLUDE all taxes. This was the case for last year's Winter Getaway and Spring Getaway passes. It's also the case for AC's usual flight pass offerings.
You do have to pay GST on passes (and QST and maybe HST if applicable) but all other taxes and fees are included.
The pass is now showing on the Flight Pass page....
Many zones, with many options. The pricing value will be dependant on your situtation. It doesn't work in my case.
For example - YYCYWG on the Prairie pass... 8 credit for $1280 plus tax. So a round trip is $336 all in. I just went online, I can book flights, in Tango, with seat assignment for $333.
Passing this time around
I also see they raised the prices on some of the other, regular passes... nice touch.
The blackout periods aren't great either. March 5-22nd and April 9-13th? So you've got half of January, February, and half of April with a few days in March (not many). I assume booking class K is available on routes that normally have no Tango fares?
Seems too restrictive to be very useful. Perhaps if they dropped the 7-day advance purchase requirement or the blackout dates, it would be worth picking up.
Also - anyone know if you can travel within your region? e.g., Central Canada Pass, can you travel within Ontario and Quebec, or can you only travel to Manitoba, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick?
Wow, After picking up on this the last 2 years I will definitely be passing! Sure they took away some of the perks between the first years pass and last years pass, but this time around its just ridiculous! Might have been able to live with the increased prices if travel was still unlimited but this is just silly. The 7 day advanced booking kills it for me as well. Everything about this pass is just a letdown compared to last years.
Oh and for the poster above, you can travel within your region. For each flight pass details page however, at the very bottom it does list which places you cannot fly between. Here for example are the places you cant fly between if you picked up a central pass for flight across canada and the u.s
Thunderbay and Minneapolis
Gaspé and Sydney
Gaspé and Charlottetown
Gaspé and Goose Bay
Sept-Iles and Deer Lake
Sept-Iles and Gander
Sept-Iles and Goose Bay
Sept-Iles and Baie-Comeau
Iles-de-la-Madeleine and Halifax
Iles-de-la-Madeleine and Moncton
Timmins and Rouyn-Noranda
Timmins and Val d'Or
So there's another letdown, I believe last year they only did not permit flights between Toronto and Ottawa because of the rapid air pass. Lol no surprise now that they no longer restrict that route seeing as its no longer unlimited! Waste 2 credits flying between them, bet they would love that!
I think AC marketing really missed the boat on this one. They obviously really dont get that the majority of people using the unlimited pass before were using it for extra, fun and perhaps even frivilous travel (ie..lunching in Whitehorse!). This pass kills all those travel plans and thus i suspect will be a dud.
Horrible blackout periods and advance boking period. I'm not sure now, I was ready to buy it ASAP. Has AC run out of ways to further alienate its core customers? I think not.
But what's this contradiction?
Quote:
Travel must be booked seven (7) days in advance of travel;
Flight credit bookings are subject to availability of the Tango fare option (K booking class).
Note: this fare option is not available for single ticket purchases on Air Canada's transborder routes as it is reserved for use by Flight Pass customers only;
Flight credits are non-transferable and can only be used by the user designated at time of purchase;
One (1) flight credit is required per direction including connections; Bookings are permitted up to one (1) hour prior to departure;
__________________ .... Life's a gas when you do not own a car
1st travel rule: Never check luggage; 2nd travel rule: see #1
I can't imagine that AC is still selling many of their flights passes at all considering the changes they've made in the past 14 months or so... It would be interesting to know the figures. Presumably they felt that they would be more profitable selling fewer passes at higher prices. I agree with llbean though; they've priced themselves out of that potential market. I suppose AC knows best though, with the great profits they've consistently been able to generate. Err... Well, never mind.
To the poster a few posts back..last year YOW-YYZ was still allowed (at least in the January version I think) but you might be correct in the spring version now that I think about it.
Anyway, holy crap this is absurd. I had suggested a few friends pick up one of these passes as a way go to a wedding and do some hopping around with the discount intl. ticket but between all the different options this is nuts. And a bit of a pain - so I can't book separate tickets for YYZ->YYC then YYC->YYZ on the Central one, I'd have to do the trips separately? Such a frustrating deal compared to previous years.
Sadly the prices on this pass are still cheaper than some of the routes I fly (ie. YYZ to YZF) but I almost don't want to purchase it because AC'll think it was a great idea to make these things. This is a very different product than their other escape passes - I don't think this one will fly with the average traveler (but perhaps that's the point). They would have been better off just raising the unlimited pass by a couple of hundred bucks.
(I was wondering though, do anyone know if I purchase the 2 person version but never attach a second name could I use all the credits myself and then end up with 4 intl. credits?)
No status miles and only 25% miles means I'm out! Not good value for me...I would rather buy a regular flight pass and get the status miles.
I just checked the AC website and I spoke too soon...I will not be buying a regular flight pass now. I just can't believe that AC feels justified to increase the Canada East Pass (10 credits) since this Escape pass went on sale. No AC flight passes are of value to me now...all are way over priced. Last I checked the economy is still in the buck AND fuel prices are have decreased drastically over the last 6 mths so how AC justifies an increased is lost on me.
