Originally Posted by
Fiordland
in the common hold area that are counters for each of the airlines. In other airports you call them transfer desks. Not certain about in Calgary. The airline are suppose to man those and that is where passengers are expected to go for all of the regular item agents due at the gate. However the airlines don't man those desk. Perhaps the airline staff have not been trained in call to the gate yet.
In my four trips out of the E gates, I've never seen a single person behind those counters. Never. A big counter. Nice signage for each airline. But, two months in to the new terminal, it seems they've never been used.
All of the airline staff are at the gates. Period. Need help? You have to leave the waiting area and go to your gate ... in a CTG terminal. Even though YYC says you're not supposed to until it's boarding time.
One big problem: staffing those counters in the central hall would require incremental headcount, meaning more cost for each airline. Exactly what WestJet is crying foul over. Totally understandable that none of the airlines are playing ball.
And it really makes me wonder to what extent AC, WS, and all of the other airlines were truly consulted in the design of the building and in the roll-out of this Call To Gate system. It sure seems like they either had little say or were ignored -- and the YYC authority just stayed on their course anyway.