Are foreign airlines required by law to provide service in French for Quebec routes?
Sep 14, 2016, 7:33 pm
#16
Join Date: Nov 2011
Posts: 201
Upon arriving in Yellowknife from Cambridge Bay a couple years back, I was a little surprised when I was asked if I preferred to make my way through security in French or English, but it does help to remind that this is officially a bilingual
country (one boards a jet in Cambridge Bay without passing through any security, but that is another story).
country (one boards a jet in Cambridge Bay without passing through any security, but that is another story).
Sep 15, 2016, 9:26 am
#17
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: NW London and NW Sydney
Programs: BA Diamond, Hilton Bronze, A3 Diamond, IHG *G
Posts: 6,343
I'm not sure why foreign airlines would be required to provide service in any language. The pilots have to speak English obviously.
Should Air Canada be forced to provide services in Spanish (+ Portuguese/Dutch) on flights to Central and South America?
Even most airlines flying to France from non-Francophone countries don't always have French-speaking FAs on board. Pre-recorded announcements seem to be the furthest many airlines will go.
Should Air Canada be forced to provide services in Spanish (+ Portuguese/Dutch) on flights to Central and South America?
Even most airlines flying to France from non-Francophone countries don't always have French-speaking FAs on board. Pre-recorded announcements seem to be the furthest many airlines will go.
Sep 15, 2016, 10:17 pm
#18
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: San Jose, Costa Rica
Programs: AAdvantage Platinum
Posts: 1,894
Should Air Canada be forced to provide services in Spanish (+ Portuguese/Dutch) on flights to Central and South America?
Sep 16, 2016, 10:26 am
#19
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 1999
Programs: FB Silver going for Gold
Posts: 21,794
The airline management may wish it but sometimes labour agreements get in the way, and of course sometimes there is no availability. I think we can all think of examples of this. I'll start with a few: NW service to/from BKK. No Thai speakers among the FAs but NW was able to hire a Thai-speaking liaison (can't remember the official term but the person was not officially an FA) for the NRT-BKK route. CP used to run YVR-(NRT)-HKG service w/o a single Cantonese speaker in the cabin crew complement! I imagine i did open the market for CX to come in and grab share (at least the bridgehead route to N America).
Sep 16, 2016, 11:05 am
#20
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Earth. Residency:HKG formerly:YYZ
Programs: CX, DL, Nexus/GE, APEC
Posts: 10,684
The airline management may wish it but sometimes labour agreements get in the way, and of course sometimes there is no availability. I think we can all think of examples of this. I'll start with a few: NW service to/from BKK. No Thai speakers among the FAs but NW was able to hire a Thai-speaking liaison (can't remember the official term but the person was not officially an FA) for the NRT-BKK route. CP used to run YVR-(NRT)-HKG service w/o a single Cantonese speaker in the cabin crew complement! I imagine i did open the market for CX to come in and grab share (at least the bridgehead route to N America).
AC TPAC flights also have multiple Chinese dialet speaking FAs also on the premium multi-language pay to compete in this market.
These are facts from an AC TPAC purser.
Sep 17, 2016, 7:54 am
#22
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Vancouver, Canada
Programs: United MileagePlus Silver, Nexus, Global Entry
Posts: 8,798
Sep 17, 2016, 4:30 pm
#23
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Earth. Residency:HKG formerly:YYZ
Programs: CX, DL, Nexus/GE, APEC
Posts: 10,684
There are many new hires based out of YVR and YYZ who are bi/multilingual but can't communicate en franciase.
Sep 17, 2016, 8:13 pm
#24
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Posts: 3,665
Sep 18, 2016, 8:23 pm
#25
Join Date: Aug 2000
Location: ZRH / YUL
Programs: UA, TK, Starwood > Marriott, Hilton, Accor
Posts: 7,293
There are many new hires based out of YVR and YYZ who are bi/multilingual but can't communicate en franciase.
Last edited by airoli; Sep 18, 2016 at 8:24 pm Reason: whoops