CZAMFlyer

Except the underlined portion was not part of the CBC story. The issue is clear: the airline is alleged to have instructed employees to inform passengers at check in that they will make their intended flight, even though it may be evident they will not. It's an issue of a lack of transparency and of being less than forthcoming.

There is nothing in the story that alleges that Air Canada denies the practice of overselling/overbooking, nor that it instructs its employees to do so. The distinction may be difficult to detect if you begin reading the story with a preconceived bias. #unrolleyes

Badenoch

So what? The check-in agent suspects but does not know for sure that the passenger might not get a seat. Why bother upsetting the passenger and face a confrontation for what amounts to no good reason. Pass them on to the next step and see what happens. I've had the dreaded GTE on my ticket and have never been IDB'd.

And if should a passenger wish to avoid this "trauma" they can pre-select a seat which is what anyone with a grain of sense does in the first place.

The pre-conceived bias belongs to the CBC which seems determined to blow everything about AC out of proportion.

Stranger

MSPeconomist

CZAMFlyer

A bias balanced by the constant minimization of any and all AC failings by its legions of die-hard defenders.

Perhaps we can agree that with Air Canada, there's room for improvement in a few areas.

canopus27

You're right, a passenger could do all of those things. Even though I believe the vast majority of them will actually make the flight anyway. And that's where I think the issue is.

I don't know what percentage of GTE passengers actually get on their originally booked flight ... and I suspect AC guards those numbers carefully as they absolutely have competitive impact ... but my belief is that the number of GTE passengers who get IDB'd is significantly less than 1%. Is it 0.1%, 0.001%, or even less, I dunno .... but it's simply not the case that most passengers who receive GTE on their BP will get IDBd.

Note that I'm not disputing that some passengers are denied boarding .... and we could have a further debate about how long the resultant delays are, and what that distribution looks like. But my concern with the CBC story is that GTE happens a lot, and the implication in the story is that GTE means you only have a 50/50 shot of getting on the plane -- and I don't think that's even close to the truth.

So, @MSPeconomist, you're right - if the gate agent told GTE passengers that there was a chance they would be denied boarding, I imagine that a healthy percentage of them would worry (even panic) and then start to make alternative plans - even though the vast majority of them will actually board their intended flight on schedule(ish). In that context, making a lot of passengers worry and possibly even start to make alternative plans, when most of them don't need to do anything -- that's not actually providing a good service to the majority.

RatherBeInYOW

I don't think anyone is saying Air Canada should be telling anyone who gets GTE on their boarding pass that they aren't going to board the plane, or even that they might not board the plane. And I have no way of knowing the percentage of people who get VDB / IDB off of a GTE, although I suspect it is higher than what you are saying.

The issue to me is that:
1) This issue disproportionately affects the FOTSG crowd, who doesn't know what GTE means, and have little to no idea that they could be IDBed.
2) Sometimes when they hand out GTE boarding passes they know there is a high risk. The check-in agent can look at the loads and understand the probabilities. But they are instructed to say nothing and pass the buck, which in some ways is understandable but in other ways must be very hard for the agents to deceive this way, hence the point of this story.
3) IDB absolutely still happens. We've all seen it many times. e.g. I was on standby for a YYZ-YOW last month, and the agent told me I was at the top of the standby list when she put me on it, and I could go to the gate, but I almost certainly would not get on the plane - it was way overbooked already. She was right; they ended up IDBing several Canadian Forces members (who were out of uniform) flying on government purchased tickets and they were rightfully pretty upset.

The frequent flier crowd understands this happens, and know how to prevent it (and having status certainly helps, we're unlikely to have this happen even if we have selected seats ahead of time and checked in online 24h beforehand). The general public understandably expects airlines to work like concerts or hockey games; I buy a ticket, I get a seat. When that doesn't happen and things blow up then you get stories in the CBC.

canopus27

None of us know that number - but can we agree that it has a significant bearing on the conversation?

If 1 person in 10 who receive a GTE on their BP were actually IDB, then I'd agree with you that AC should give an early heads up to passengers at risk.

Can you agree with me that if the number is actually 1 in 10,000, then AC would actually be causing more harm than good by warning all 10,000?

My hope is that if we can agree on those endpoints, then it will transition this discussion to be more about frequency of IDB (which is knowable, even if not by us in public) than abstract things like "good for FF but bad for FOTSG"

RangerNS

Could a low/no-status PAX with an assigned seat be bumped before a status PAX with GTE?

I suspect so.

The TA here has a small view of the system. They don't understand.

They only used to work at the airport.

canopus27

I was talking with cow about this recently - the answer is yes.

One of the documented privileges of both 75K and SE is "Guaranteed Reservations in Economy Class"
Lets suppose everyone shows up for that flight .... someone is going to get bumped, even if they previously had a seat assignment.

CodyX2

there's nothing new about what they did. haha

canadiancow

Let's look at 125 YYZ-YVR today. There are currently 12 people who are checked in but do not have a confirmed seat assignment. I'm sure that number will be much higher by the time the flight departs.

canadiancow

Up to 17

PB53x11

And yet, you can still buy seats on this flight.

canadiancow

Exactly why it's a good test case. They sold more Y seats than they have.