Originally Posted by
seawolf
If it is outside carrier’s control, AC should either be operating all fights to/from US or none. The moment that only certain flights get removed from schedule but not others illustrates the carrier does indeed have control.
It's not Ottawa telling AC to cancel the morning flight and not the afternoon flight. It's not COVID being more transmittable in the morning but not the evening.
In any case, this is a DoT proceeding, don't know if a US judge is going to look at APPR. They definitely don't look at EC261/2004 claims.
My comment about controllable vs uncontrollable has nothing to do with the fiasco Air Canada has found itself in with the DOT as you have correctly pointed out a US judge will probably not care what the APPR says.
But both the CTA and the European Commission would disagree with the standard of an "uncontrollable or extraordinary circumstances" cancellation would dictate a all or nothing approach to flights. Even the EU recognized that de-facto cancellation (due to government restrictions) as a result of COVID would fall under extraordinary circumstances. Air Canada could reduce the flight schedule as a result of COVID restrictions (Say from 3 to 1 a day) bleeding demand and the causation of the cancellation could very well fall under "uncontrollable" or "extraordinary circumstances" per both CTA and EU guidelines.
CTA's proposed approach of refund for uncontrollable cancellations where re-protection cannot be offered within 48 hours is also problematic imo. Most passengers would still have CC Chargeback rights if their flights are cancelled by the airline regardless of the airline's reprotection offers.