navksahota

I just had one of the worst travel experiences with #AirCanada. I was denied boarding with my 20 month old baby from Detroit to Vancouver. I had booked my flight two weeks before and last Sunday (1/8/17), i called Air Canada's customer service at 2:05pm to verify that i did not need a passport for my son. I was provided wrong information by the air Canada employee and told that i could travel with his birth certificate alone. Today, i arrived at the airport and then was told by the agent that I could not travel because I in fact did need a passport for my son. I was extremely upset and disappointed and asked for a refund. I was informed that i needed to call customer service for that. I asked to speak with the manager and this is where it became the worst experience of my life. The manager, Susan (Account Manager) was rude and said I needed to call customer service. I asked her exactly "who" did I need to talk to and did she not represent Air Canada. I asked her exactly what can she help me with and what my options were and she sarcastically stated "Do you want me to let you board so you can get arrested by customs and deported"?
She then also looked over at her friend who came over and stated "I am glad you are here to watch this" as if this was some sort of a show. She and her friend had a smirk on their faces and told me I was overreacting.

I am extremely disappointed by the extremely low standards Air Canada has in selection of its employees, let alone manager level. How do you even staff a "Manager" level employee who had absolutely 0 customer service skills at the airport counter where they have to interact with humans?

I have never been more humiliated and had all my family plans altered. Not only did I not get to go on a planned trip with my son, my husband missed his flight to the conference that he had booked flight and hotel for due to last minute change in our plans, thanks to Air Canada's incompetence.

I have filed a complaint on Air Canada's website, but is there a recourse? Or are we as paying customers just supposed to let these organizations and their employees treat us in this terrible manner?

zrh2yvr

Although this has not been a pleasant experience, the passenger is responsible for their own travel documents and the airline does not provide advice to passengers. The best you can hope for is a credit for future travel and perhaps if you are lucky, a no-fee change. Passports have been required for all passengers for quite a long time.

The agent was also correct in that if you were to arrive without the passport of the infant, you would have been deported and the airline would actually have been faced with a very steep fine.

Sorry about your difficult experience but unfortunately, it is not the airline's fault or problem.

trek604

Quick 10 second Google search shows results from both CBSA and US CBP on infants flying. They do specifically require passports.

This is not Air Canada's problem.

Northern Canuck

The passport issue may not be AC's problem but the way Susan handled the situation certainly is.
@ the OP, welcome to the world of Air Canada. I'm sure you will remember this incident the next time you are looking for a ticket.

Diabeetus

navksahota:

There are at least two lessons you need to learn here:

1. Do not to take someone's word for granted as reliable and trustworthy. As zrh2yvr and trek604 mention, the information needs to be from a proper official source (CBSA and US CBP) and it is low effort to get to it.

2. Don't be lazy on getting passports for your children. Transborder travel has required it for many years. I have a 20 month old as well, and when we took her on her first trip to SF last year, we got her passport well in advance in order to extra time as part of contingency planning.

To be honest, as another parent, I do not think you did your own due diligence for your child. If AC let you travel, then you and your child would have been deported at your own cost. So the agent did you a favor, even if they didn't have the best customer service tone. You need to take ownership of your own mistakes, and also teach your children to take ownership of their mistakes as well, instead of blaming others.

Stranger

I would not pass judgement until I hear the other side. What the lady said is absolutely true in any event.

Diabeetus

Also, from the air canada website (another 10 second google search):

https://beta.aircanada.com/ca/en/aco...documents.html

see travel documents for children.

24left

@navksahota

I see 2 separate but related issues you describe in your Post.

1. The issue of a passport for your infant

As per the 3 replies above, passengers are responsible for making sure they are flying with all the necessary ID documents for the country they are entering.

Both Canada and the U.S. have travel websites where this information is posted. In addition, a good travel agent would make sure to advise their clients to have what is needed to enter another country.

It is also rather unfortunate that you did not post an inquiry here prior to travel.


2. The issue of rude or poor customer service from Air Canada employees.

It is unfortunate that the phone agent you spoke to gave you incorrect information. Without any of us being there to hear the call, either the agent was in fact wrong, or the question you asked was not the one the agent might have provided the correct answer to. Did you get the name and call centre of the agent, or the date and time of the call?

As for the airport manager, again, since none of us were there to watch this unfold or in fact know if they were AC employees or contracted by AC, there is not much we can do after the fact.

If they provided you with incorrect information, or told you to call AC without giving you an exact phone number, and of course their behaviour, you can certainly contact Air Canada in writing as there is no one to talk to on the phone.


It is sad that you had this seriously negative experience and at this point, the best you can do is provide very detailed information to Air Canada.

But as noted, without the passport for your child, you would not have been allowed entry and that would have caused way more problems for everyone. If an airline allows someone to board without the documents needed to fly to their destination, they are fined a large amount and are then forced to fly that person back to the point of origin.


Others on this forum can correct my post if required.

jerry305

If you were only asking on Sunday about whether you need a passport for a flight on Saturday, that wouldn't have been a lot of time to get a passport.

I believe you would've needed to have made an urgent pick-up request, and that could require you to show proof of illness or death of a family member.

https://www.google.ca/search?q=rush++passport+canada

mapleg

If I am reading the timeline correctly, you booked the flight without first checking to see if a passport would be required for your child. Then roughly a week after booking you called customer service and claim they gave you incorrect information.

Did you not think to google the question or do any further research beyond that point?

As a sidebar, I don't think naming employees in a public forum is a proper. Name then in a letter to Air Canada if you wish, but throwing their name into a public forum is lacking in decorum. The other person has no chance at all to defend themselves or provide evidence contrary to yours.

RZR

I'm on the OP's side, although if I were in that situation, I would have gone to the boarder website.

The airline is at fault in my opinion. They have given "incorrect" info to an inquiry, as opposed to replying " check with gov't agency".

DaveObee

The rules that were ignored by the OP have been well explained already.

Re the manager, Susan -- frankly, she might be able to argue that she has been defamed by this post. The rest of us were not there, we did not witness the discussion, and we are only hearing one side, that of a person who is upset. Strip away the over-the-top comments such as "worst experience of my life" and "never been more humiliated" and take it down to the basic points, and what you have is an AC manager explaining that someone had not followed the rules and therefore would not be allowed to fly. In the absence of an independent witness, I would argue that Susan -- should have the benefit of the doubt. What we know for a fact is that she was there, and she was doing her job, and in the end she did what was best for the airline and for the passenger.

And for the record, I am not an AC apologist, but I don't think any of my dealings with the airline over 37 years of flying with them would crack the top 100 worst experiences of my life, let alone be THE worst. (That FA on YUL-CDG about a decade ago was probably not far from the top 100, I admit...)

flyquiet

I doubt the OP will be back, but booking an international flight two weeks ahead and then making a last minute inquiry about passports is careless. There is information online when flights are booked either with TA or AC that refers to travel documents, if people care to read it.

I can easily imagine the phone call getting incorrect information the way it is presented here "i called Air Canada's customer service at 2:05pm to verify that i did not need a passport for my son." Had the question been framed "I called to find out IF my son needed a passport for an international flight," I am sure the correct information would have been provided. Of course, it is likely a passport would not be obtainable in time.

It is not clear what nationality of passport is needed, but if the OP is based in DTW, seems to me the last-minute options for Canadian passport are slim, and U.S. passport nearly none. (Mini-FQ obtained a US passport by physically going to the US consulate in no less than 2 weeks, and had to delay her travel for a week as a result.)

I think putting the named person on the spot in an anonymous post is rich. However, does AC even have their own employees at DTW? I can't recall ever flying to, from, or through it, but I would never expect AC agents at most US stations to be "representing" AC.

You can push almost anyone to a rude retort and I doubt the reported comment was the AC rep's first response. If I were on the receiving end of this rant, asked "exactly "who" did I need to talk to", I would have had a hard time resisting saying "Mary. Mary is who you need to talk to."

If OP was bound and determined to get that baby to YVR without proper papers, why not fly DTW-SEA and try the birth certificate at the land border crossing?

I think the title of the thread could pass for the forum name, so I have no argument with the general idea that service could be lacking, but the OP created the situation, and wants AC to take the blame.

24left

Well that plus venting on FT is cheap therapy for some.

yyznomad

@navksahota

Welcome to FT?!

Sorry to hear about your experience.