FYI, I just digged up a reservation I made about 3 weeks ago using Lan Chile (Oneworld)'s Lan Pass KM. The itineary is JFK-SCL-IPC-SCL-JFK in Lan Chile Business Class. We are going to visit Easter Island and then go onward to spend a week in Tahiti also on Lan Chile. The total taxes per person was $70 USD and that's because it also include domestic Chilean taxes for travel to Easter Island. When I made my booking at Lan.com; the website gave me very clear breakdown of what the taxes and fees were in USD. This is for an award booking, not a revenue ticket but no less, it was very clear. At the time when I made the reservation, Lan Chile did levy a YQ on revenue ticket but LA did not charge me any fuel surcharge when making the redemption using points.

Keep in mind, LA also files from YYZ to SCL via JFK and as you can tell from the link I provided above, their new Premium Business class will beat Air Canada's J anyday so the two carriers are direclty comparable in your itineary here. So out of curiosity, I checked ITN just now and I noticed LA no longer charges any YQ on revenue tickets between YYZ and SCL or JFK and SCL, it's gone = zero! Given the price of oil these days, this makes every sense.

This comparison with Lan Chile tells us some interesting things about Air Canada:

First, we have two carriers competing on exact same routing: YYZ-SCL. The pricing is for Canadian market which means they are directly comparable. Yet one charges YQ for an outrageous $385 CAD and the other, a big zero. However, neither of them have anykind of privileged access to the price of jet fuel so how come LA can afford to drop YQ while Air Canada continues to charge an outrageous amount for it? BTW, LA's business class ticket is more expensive than AC, even without YQ so no, LA is not competing on price against AC. Besides, YQ should not be about price, right, it's about fuel, n'est-ce pas?

Secondly, with respect to award ticket, when I redeemed my Lan Chile points for an award ticket on Lan Chile, the carrier did not charge me any YQ even though I would have to pay if the booking was a revenue ticket. This was at the end of November 2008, not a long time ago. This raises questions as to whether Air Canada is engaging in revenue enhancing practices on Aeroplan redemptions and whether this should be allowed in Canada.

Last but not least, LA seems to have a consistent YQ practice where both the Canadian and US market on this YYZ/JFK-SCL route are treated the same wrt to fuel surcharge. The airfare is obviously not the same and that's fair and airlines are free to charge however amount they want. However, the way AC levy fuel surcharges raises question whether it is YQ at all to begin with. You may also want to consult this thread at the ORP forum: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/only-...er-expose.html

I don't know about you, but luckily we have Lan Chile to serve as a comparable since they do fly to/from YYZ to SCL and as well as from USA to SCL. There is enough evidences to file a complaint, I think, with the appropriate ombudsman office in Canada provided you have already made a booking with Aeroplan and have a standing in this issue. If I were you, I would file a complaint re: fuel surcharge - not some useless letter to Aeroplan, but an actual complaint with the appropriate governmental agencies based on facts and this comparison to Lan Chile. I'd be interested to hear how the ombudsman office would respond and depending on what they say, I may also write to my MP and asking him to bring this issue up when the Parliament resumes since a monopoly needs to be regulated or else it's going to treat Canadians like its personal ATM.