AC is the only airline MrsNWIFlyer and I have been forced to check baggage with - due to weight, not size.

It was a LHR-YVR-SFO flight, a few years ago, where unfortunately we had to go to a desk because our on-line check-in hadn't worked and the kiosks were also failing to play ball with the second segment.

The agent insisted on weighing our single piece of carry-on, which in itself was hardly bulging at the seams. It came up at something like 12kg against a limit of 10kg and she almost joyously told me that it would have to be checked. I asked her if she was really sure that this was a sensible way to treat two *G's (with BD at the time) who each accumulated several tens of thousands of miles on AC alone in a year, but all to no avail. There was absolutely no way I was ever getting it back as she played the Health & Safety trump card of the carry-on coming out of the overhead and hitting someone on the head.

I was not a happy bunny ... and in fact, for a year or so I avoided AC as a result and only travelled on US airlines given I concluded that the lure of a glass of cheap wine with a meal in no way compensated for the aggravation of waiting for cases both during transit and at final destination.

Eventually the alcoholic in me returned and I came back, only to hit the middle of one of the strikes and come up against the usual less than helpful performance of Customer Services! Perhaps AC is trying to tell me something