Originally Posted by
uwbrother
It seems to me that OP has seen a deteoration of benefits he receives over the years. I think he already stopped seeing value in staying loyal to AC. That $122 was probably him giving AC one last chance. Based on what he's written, if the $122 incident didn't happen then the next little incident would've caused this because it wasn't about the last incident at all. Though I must admit, I have to side with AC here and say that they shouldn't replace that $122 (it's like going to your favourite restaurant and ask them to pay for a burned meal you had in a *different* restaurant). But in this case I think OP was just so unsatisfied with AC that he was probably subconsciously looking for an excuse to leave his loyalty.
Even if the money wasn't stolen, the next event would've triggered the same thing because it's about the way OP feels treated / ignored by AC.
I am a Canadian who's spent a lot of time in the US and I've seen what happens when a society gets obsessed with getting the cheapest price possible at any cost. Screw the environment, labour rights, local economies, local manufacturing, service standard, quality ... as long as we get the cheapest price possible. That culture doesn't exist in Canada everywhere (which is why Canadians pay more for everything), but that culture does exist with airlines. As a result, airlines (rightfully or wrongfully) compete by providing the cheapest possible fare (sometimes scamming people by sneaking in "fuel surcharge" which is sometimes higher than the fare itself).
Personally I wish AC provided good enough service where it could say "we're not the cheapest by price but we provide the best value for your money". We've all seen how Detroit automakers destoyed themselves by trying to compete on price alone, eventually building utter garbage while German automakers with worse unions did really well by focusing on quality. I wish there was an Apple of airlines, one that charged high margin but provided an experience where people happily paid that margin. I thought that's what the business class was designed to do. And I honestly thought reward programs (which are actually incredibly profitable for airlines) were also designed to do that. In that sence AC did fail for the OP.
1. OP isn't leaving because incidents happen - we all know they happen with all airlines. Next event of this type would not have triggered this response. The next
bad handling of the situation by AC would. This poor handling of the situation is more reflective of AC's corporate culture than it is of OP's desire to depart, which is pretty much the opposite of what you're insinuating about OP.
2. Your analogy re: the restaurant does not work. He paid one restaurant for a meal and was put - by this restaurant - in the other restaurant, where he was served the burnt meal. If he had gone directly to the other restaurant and paid them for the meal, your analogy would have worked. Unfortunately, in this case, it does not. At the very least, it is up to restaurant 1 (AC) to deal with restaurant 2 (DL) to figure out what went wrong, since the restaurant 1 sent him to restaurant 2.
3. Don't know which part of Canada you're living in, but the Canadian market is roughly the same as the American market - cheaper=better. We pay a lot more than Americans for the exact same product - "screw the environment, labor rights etc"-type of products. We even have Walmarts here. And even when we do pay more, we don't get any extra quality (environmental friendliness etc) for it. Theres precious little available here that isn't available in the US for the same, or lower price. The only difference is that some of us seem to think that paying $3 for a $2 product is a good thing because it somehow helps the environment or labor rights. Evidence?
4. Air Canada doesn't charge cheap fares. It charges premium fares - ie what the market can bear. It charges as much as it possibly can - and succeeds partly because some people (I wont name names :P) think its a good idea to pay those high prices because its apparently 'good' for Canada. Of course, this would require you to conveniently ignore the impact it has on disposable income, which is crucial for the survival of businesses in several industries. You're paying a premium price to get minimum to mediocre service, up here in Canada. In the US you pay minimum price and get minimum service. Don't forget that Canada's 'cheap' fares are much higher than their global equivalents in the developed world on a cost-per-mile basis. Blame taxes all you want, but theres also a lot of gouging going on.
5. There are several Apples of airlines, but they only exist in countries where people are willing to pay the premium. Canada isn't one of those countries - we like cheap stuff here, partly because we're haemorraging disposible income by overpaying for everything. Airlines like SQ come to mind, because they charge premiums but people are happy to pay those premiums.