wayner92

Which describes me perfectly, but I still reserve the right to ..... and moan about the Scamcharges.

sp4294

Well, you DID moan and you are STILL flying with them.

You are EXACTLY what AC wants! Another satisfied AC customer! Enjoy your trip

Now... WHAT was the point of this entire thread again (besides getting to 35 posts)?

chx1975

I do not get it. I truly do not get it. I fly twice a year from Vancouver to Europe and back. I like business Typically a business class trip from YVR to Europe on AC is 4500 CAD at least but more often than not it's more than $5000.

I can trick a trip to Europe (yes, US transit but only one way, oh well, just had my NEXUS interview today) for 90 000 miles plus less than 600 in fees. That makes one point worth 5 cents (!) when I can buy them for 3c directly from Aeroplan and it's not too hard to get them for 2 cent (Plastiq is 2 cents exactly, SPG is even better: buy 20 000 SPG points with their 15% discount, on transfer you get 5000 from SPG, 4000 from Air Canada making it less than 1.8c) occasionally even less (50K points with AMEX for $500 that's 1c).

What am I missing here? Even if you were to pay $1000 in fees and we presume your equivalent ticket is $4500 ticket, your 90k miles replace paying $3500 making one mile value close to 3.9c. There's a saving in Aeroplan even for that case.

In other words, if I pay two cents for my miles and 1000 dollars in fees, I am paying $2800 for an YVR-Europe business class return. Do you guys know a way to buy YVR-Europe return below $3000 on business class with just dollars and no miles trickery? (Note. Air Transat Club class is not business, gimme a break.)

Maybe United's program is better but as I do not fly enough (by far) to have a meaningful status / point accumulation just by flying -- instead I rely on purchases, cards (I use an Aeroplan Visa card) to have enough points and I doubt Canada offers many good chances for United.

Edit: if the problem is that the reward tickets are supposed to be free, I can't care less, sorry.

INEC

I just tried to book multiple YYZ - USA flights (one way) in June. United.com shows lots of availability for my date of travel, but when I called Aeroplan and fed them the various (United) flight details, they said they showed no availability. The agent kept trying to get my to fly AC and therefore pay the scamcharges.

Is it possible that united.com shows availability that is in fact not open to Aeroplan? Should I keep calling back and trying for another agent, supervisor, or am I stuck?

scotchmeup

were you seeing Saver (BLUE) award inventory? This is the only ones that you can access via aeroplan.

rankourabu

not unless you are trying to book out of an elite United account. And of course as mentioned, they must be blue - saver awards.

Also, fees wont correspond, Aeroplan adds extra govt taxes (NAV CAN?) on top of scamcharges.

arcticbull

It does happen from time to time on regional flights that united.com shows extra availability that can't be booked by star alliance partner airlines. I've experienced this myself on ewr-yow. Couldn't book on any partners (AC, US) but could book with my UA miles.

rankourabu

The only way thats possible if the flight is operated by Silver or Cape.

The rest should be available to others - its generic I inventory.

Lornag

Not to hijack this thread (well maybe), but I have been suffering from the above the last few months, trying to get some j seats on aeroplan to europe for the end of June. Some just showed up on lufthansa...biz class all the way (we are going to france) so there is availability...yes loads of fees, but at least they are there.
Cheers from 30000 feet on Alaska Airlines (with a 50 dollar LMU YVR to lax)...

Yay!

Lornag

Boogie711

I really don't understand the paranoia about going through the USA, especially considering we are a country where 90% of us live within 100 miles of the border.

I am wondering if everyone who complains about transiting through the USA should either apply for a pardon, or stop smoking weed... ?

ffsim

What is there not to understand? Without Nexus/GE, it's an enormous pain in the butt. I've had colleagues spend 3-4 hours waiting to pass immigration at MIA and JFK just to save some $$$ on their airfare.

Some people, especially infrequent flyers who aren't familiar with every airport in North America and who don't belong to trusted traveller programs, would happily spend their money on a Canadian airline instead of transiting through the US. And I haven't even mentioned the crooks who work for the TSA...

Not all Canadians are pot smokers or criminals

tinchote

Not true. I recently booked YQR-EZE on the AE website (by the way, the AE site allowed me to book 7 tickets all together in the same flights!). Flights on United (well, one short leg on AC) and total taxes/fees came to $138 per ticket.

jarusoba

Paranoia? Maybe.

I don't like my checked baggage to be rampaged by dirty, dishonest TSA thugs without my presence. If they don't trust me, why do I trust them?

90% of us live within 160 km of the border doesn't mean that I belong to that country.

heraclitus

Sorry for wandering off topic, but I have to ask - is that typical at MIA and JFK?

I have only transited from overseas to Canada through ORD and found US customs (I have no Nexus/GE) there to be a not-too-painful process besides just having to wait a bit... not unlike waiting in a longish customs line at YYZ. I think the longest I ever waited was like maybe 30 minutes tops?

Are the lines in other US airports that much worse? If so I will take it into account when planning connections...

ffsim

I'm not sure if it's typical or not -- my colleagues only made the "mistake" of connecting in the US once at each airport

That being said, I assume the delay was in large part due to a high number of arriving international flights. Maybe they were just unlucky, but they weren't interested in gathering further empirical data