FiveGuysNamedRay

I'm now enjoying all the luxuries of the Sandman hotel near YVR. AC flight 45 was supposed to take off at 7:40 am on the 11th from DEL and arrive in YVR in afternoon. It actually did take off at 4:45 pm that day-- I got a couple of text messages to that effect, which is better than my colleague, who showed up at the airport at 6 am only to wait around all day. The would not give me a connecting boarding pass to SEA (though they did give one to my colleague, more on this later)....They sent me to the SQ SilverKris lounge in Delhi which was (yes, I'm serious) padlocked with a big chain through the door handles. Finally somebody shows up and says go to Plaza Premium upstairs-- they want us to pay to enter. The actual sleep pod in J on the 787 is actually very nice, and a couple of the FAs were very apologetic (crew change? mysteries abound, AC would not explain). I did mention repeatedly that I had a connection to SEA when I landed and it was the last flight of the day, departing only 35 mins after this flight arrived. The third time an FA said "I'm sure it'll be fine," I started getting nervous. We land, and the only AC staff outside the plane have signs for Canada domestic connections. We ask what to do about Seattle, they say, "no problem, go to USA transit area." OK, we run down there, and it's......closed. No, I'm not kidding, a woman started gesturing to us to say "go through immigration and check in again." We run through immigration, go up to USA check in zone (zero staff there, empty), and I try to get a boarding pass. Cannot-- too late for flight. Since there are literally no staff, I walk/run to the AC domestic area, where a guy takes me over to the ticketing area, and I wait, and wait, of course. They hem and haw and say that (shockingly) this was AC's fault. So, after a half hour of this, they say I can sit (in eco) of course tomorrow morning-- but tonight AC will comp me the beautiful Sandman hotel-- which is a shuttle ride away (I learn later that my colleague ended up in the Fairmont, which is walkable). They tell me to go to arrivals and call AC baggage to get my bag, and told me it would take five minutes. 45 minutes later, after they collect my bag, I go to wait for the shuttle, which I wait another 25 minutes wait. At 10 pm, a mere 3 hours after arriving, and 23 hours after we were supposed to originally take off, I'm in the hotel room. They did comp me, as a biz passenger, a $15 food certificate for YVR-- yay, this totally makes up for it all. At least today is a new day.....If Air Canada really wants to compete on the India-North America routes, they will have to do better-- there are lots of options from Delhi (BA, LH, Qatar, Emirates, even United).....

rankourabu

There is a reason why AC is cheaper for USA-Asia/India/Europe routes than the ME3 and Asian carriers
I can think of a half dozen options better than AC for your routing. Hope you learned your lesson and spread the word to your colleagues, friends, etc.

yyznomad

Transpacificflyer

Although I am sympathetic to you for the poor treatment extended by Air Canada I believe that the experience must take into account some typical characteristics of flights to India from North America;
- These are not the most profitable routes and are subject to a cost sensitive customer demographic.
- Airlines do not typically offer their best aircraft/cabin options on these routes and the nicer carriers have to cut their costs some way to offset the price sensitive airfares allowances.
(It is no different than AF using its decrepit 'Africa/Caribbean' configuration for CDG-YUL routes.)
- Air Canada offers some of the shortest duration options for for the SEA-DEL. (Yes, I know that BA is pretty close on one flight but the fare is usually more and it is a cram the pax in configuration.)
- Flying the India routes is never fun, nor is the Indian airport experience anything other than a headache.
- Nothing stopped you from selecting an alternative hotel, if there was availability elsewhere. The Fairmont is about C$400 at the airport and the Sandman around $200. The hotels around YVR are a motley collection. If unhappy, pick a better quality hotel. Same for food. If $15 inadequate, pay the difference.
- Air Canada most likely has one of the cheapest airfares, probably $1,000+ cheaper. Use some of the savings to cover the additional costs.

Yes, you probably got abused in this regard, but United isn't any better. Air Canada has one of the worst OTPs, and they really don't care. FFs who use the airline, know this and budget their time accordingly. If you want quality and OTP , yes, you must select another airline. However, the premium quality airlines do not target the Indian market and the airfares on other carriers will be more expensive, so there will be a trade off.

Again, sorry for your experience.

mellon

well at least your seat was not deflated, on top of the worst OTP Air Canada has a major problem with broken J seats on its planes. Unfortunately, your letter of complaint will fall on deft ears, AC staff consider a 23 hr delay acceptable and have been trained not to care.
reality unless you are an Aeroplan/Altitude customer trying to get status you should not be flying AC.

YEG USER

So it's ok to drop the ball on a paid J pax on a misconnect because the flight originated in India? IMHO most of the frustration in the post is about what took place in YVR. Pax should have been greeted upon arrival with hotel/meal voucher and onward boarding pass instead of getting sent from place to place due to lack of staffing. That likely would have minimized some of the frustration.

As far as what the competition offers, pricing comparisons, what to expect during a delay in India, etc. I think those are fair points, but once you are onboard AC's aircraft and flying through one of their hubs IMHO it shouldn't matter what country you're flying from/to. AFAIK Int'l Signature Service doesn't advertise different standards based on destination.

yulred

Biscuittin

vernonc

It is two way traffic to India so much as the "Indian" customer might be cheaper as per Transpacific flyer, its not all like that. Indians are used to cheaper LCC which IMHO are actually better than some NA mainline carriers - they are on time, cleaner and newer and seat configs might be better than Rouge.
Most local carriers put their lowest international product on the Gulf routes as they are short haul and price sensitive. For the Indian customer the gold standard and probably rightly so is the ME carriers and far east carriers (SQ, etc). I know people who pay more to fly EK in Y as an example. Not very long ago LH uses to fly their old 747 to India with the overhead TV screens. Now that they have newer planes and decent connections, FRA/MUC and even ZRH (LX) are good transit points.
Now that 9W is dead, perhaps AC can try the BOM route again perhaps once the PAK airspace issue also clears up. I am also assuming that airlines will have to make plans to currently not fly around Yemen, and soon perhaps avoid Iranian airspace and the vicinity with all the recent sabre rattling. So finding a safe route to BOM might involve avoiding PAK airspace, Iran/Iraq and Yemen. Flights to/from India have gotten more expensive with the demise of 9W.

yulred

yulred

HMPS

You are correct. AM an expat and visit India every year. The Middle Class there is exploding numbers...people have money, have started spending it , great travel thirst. USA visas have been made very difficult so US is losing $$$$, more Indians go to Europe than USA.

vernonc

Re Iran airspace, yes, AC was and everyone is using it to get to BOM. However what I was alluding too is the current US/Iran sabre rattling and the threat of hostilities. If that happens, then very likely no one will overfly Iran airspace. It is a big what-if but would affect AC/UA more since they will be at the edge of their fuel limits to allow for any further deviation.
Re AC Y to India and BOM in particular, I have flown the route as have several people I know. Many complaints about leg room and a lot of complaints about food quality. Some would definitely fly others over AC even with a stop since they would possibly get a lower price and better soft/hard product. And as I stated earlier some would pay more to fly EK.

Santander

AC flies all sorts of equipment into LHR. 763s have better J/Y ratios than 789s. Filling planes to LON from Canada is easy, so they can get away with flying whatever they want.

There's no getting around the fact that India is a price-sensitive market. AC can certainly fill the front of the plane with good yield pax, but their 789s have horrible J/Y ratios. UA, NH and BA, among others, have far more J seats on their 789s. And while there are moneyed people in India, they have idiosyncratic spending habits and in any case, are not clamoring to fly AC. High-end retail in India is extremely underdeveloped and not even close to what you can get in Canada, which itself is a backwater for luxury goods - there is not a single Patek Philippe retailer in all of India, for example.

Of course, this is completely unrelated to the bad experiences described by OP. But I think it is perfectly fair to describe India as a challenging market for profitability.

yulred