HA! - More like Communism or National Socialism if you ask me!

Re the fare flouts: I really can't see how that could be considered criminal. If someone buys and pays for a ticket that covers the flights on which they use the ticket, and they are the person to whom the ticket is issued, this is a problem for AC, not the passenger. The rules for missing the first and last segments are too ambiguous for anything serious to come of it.

There is no onus on the passenger to "prove" that they were, or were not, on an earlier flight, or anything else for that matter. It is up to AC to "prove" that the passenger was not on the first segment, and they would have to do this before denying the passenger boarding on a confirmed flight with a confirmed seat and a "valid" ticket without compensation. The "no-show" automatic computer cancellation takes care of this in most normal situations when someone misses their flight. But to invalidate the ticket on the basis of a flight being out of sequence, AC would have to actually prove that a previous segment had not been flown, and why.

This has happened to me once when I was stuck in a queue to process excess baggage at LHR, and missed my JNB flight. I was put on a later BA flight, but bought a ticket on SAA for the next regional segment, and on the way back used a full business ticket on a regional segment for the same BA flight which my other ticket with the long haul portions had me booked in K class. Even though as far as they were concerned the K class flights out of JNB were quite obviously out of sequence, (on 3 totally different PNRs) I was not even for a moment questioned about it, and at no point did anyone attempt to offload me. They really didn't seem to know or care how I got to JNB, only that I had a valid ticket for onward travel.

Believe it or not, most passengers do not keep their bording passes, so it would be unreasonable to demand this. Ditto for baggage claim checks (where applicable) and old ticket receipts. Passengers are not obliged to keep these documents after the flights have been taken.

Air Canada is truly mad if they are trying to brand people as criminals for saving money. Remember, Milton is the one that can go to prison for 5 years for hiking fares!

And again AC*SE, anyone with access to the PNR can cancel the first segment. It will not flag anything if the booking for that segment is cancelled beforehand. And again, in any airport with a Kiosk this is not an issue, as the passenger would never have to speak to an agent in the first place.

I must stress that I personally have never done this and I have no interest ever doing it. But it IS possible, and to the best of my knowledge it is not criminal.

[This message has been edited by Fly Boy (edited 12-17-2000).]