Originally Posted by j2simpso

Correct me if I'm wrong but AC flights to UA should never be a cause for concern. There is no written rule that says if you fly Air Canada you must credit to Aeroplan even if you are a citizen of Canada and fly them all the time. Many Canadians (myself included) have seen the light and have determined that there are far better *A frequent flyer programs out there (namely UA and OZ). In fact one could argue that AC hasn't had a frequent flyer program since 2005 when the airline sold its frequent flyer program and that the current incarnation of Aeroplan has AC weakly in the loop. That being said, there are a few grey areas I can think of where crediting flights to UA may be questionable.

Firstly, he could be booking an award flight using his Aeroplan points/account then after the ticket is issued update the FF number attached to the ticket. A legitimate reason for doing this is to access the *A benefits you have in another program (i.e. UA Gold) which you don't have with Aeroplan. Others have mentioned that in the off chance that Aeroplan incorrectly issues the ticket (i.e. issued as Y instead of X) you might end up earning mileage credit to your frequent flyer account.

Secondly, he could have purchase an AC flight pass which requires membership in the Aeroplan program to use. However, after they have purchased the flight pass, they could start issuing tickets with the pass, supposing there is availability on the days they want to travel. After the flight pass tickets are issued they are handled like any other AC flight ticket, meaning that again you could update your FF account to UA to collect the miles (and access to the *A benefits). Normally this wouldn't be a big deal for AC since you can generally purchase a fixed amount of credits at a fixed price that is generally priced above the cheapest rate AC charges for the route in question. However, it's possible to purchase flight passes that provide unlimited travel within a region. This would normally mean that you could earn nearly unlimited mileage using the pass since you could keep booking and taking flights on AC crediting miles to whatever *A program you want. However, to prevent such abuse AC caps the maximum number of miles you can accumulate per month to a fixed amount (i.e. 10,000). However, if he kept crediting it to another *A partner like UA, presumably he could keep earning miles indefinitely.

Thirdly, he could be crediting his AC flights to Aeroplan and then later on requesting missing flight credit from UA for the same flight in question. In theory *A and its member airlines should be keeping track of where these flights get credited to but in practice there could be a lead time where they could "double dip" on the mileage successfully.

This is all speculation and I suspect that whatever the case may be he is be counselled by a good attorney who combed through the T&Cs of the programs, products and fares he's used with a fine tooth comb to ensure he hasn't broken any rules. Based on the simple fact that it is going to court should imply that his lawyer feels that a compelling case could be made that how AC/Aeroplan handled him was inappropriate.

Safe Travels,

James

Originally Posted by CZAMFlyer

Are you implying it's ok to defraud a company of some smaller items, as long as you pay for the larger ones?