mapleg

When you call the normal AC reservations line these days you get a voice recording saying I am the friendly service guy for all of Air Canada. Due to our incompetence, we cannot actually accept phone calls from customers, so , no soup for you. Try again, one week. Then maybe one month.

I don't think they are going to get worked up that someone claims they did not get the proper zone boarding they were entitled to .

Yet their stock keeps going up and up.

jc94

It's interesting that should AC IT be able to print the correct zone number on a BP this entire issue would not have arisen.

But I understand this is a complex IT system that probably affects many airlines. This is not entirely tongue in cheek actually given I had this issue once on AA, but then AA isn't the top airline in NA or whatever AC claims these days.

Fiordland

If the union thinks customers don't want to deal with people but anonymous robots then perhaps it is time to drive operations efficiencies increase profits. Take a few of gate areas put glass walls around them and an entry where you scan your boarding pass and some face recognition software compares you to your id. Once in you wait until someone comes to open the gate. There is some great AI interfaces that can man the counter and it hard to tell if your dealing with a real person or not.

jaysona

At least one of the grievances is related to FA's because many FA's are repeatedly stalked and harassed by creepers on a daily basis. This is why FA's (except for SD's) can have a pseudonym on their name tag.

canadiancow

And if you read the news, the same happens in the reverse direction.

But I've never been able to look up an employee's name and address at the gate. I've had at least one agent do that to me for no valid reason.

garykung

FWIW - I do believe the GA did mean deported.

Given that OP was in the U.S. controlled gate area, to me, deported mean kicking OP back to Canada.

The GA was definitely in the wrong. However, his wrong is not due to his incompetence, but AC. Based on reports on FT, it seems like AC is having problem coding BG for those using credit card privilege. So even OP was clearly entitled for BG2, the GA was simply following what was printed on the BP.

The question remaining is whether asking an employee's name is an escalation or not. This is a question we can only estimate, as we will never be able to get the GA to respond. But to say the least, if OP asked an employee's name after a confrontation, no matter how small it was, OP's intention was clear that OP wanted to make a complaint with AC. So OP did escalate, nicely or not.

If the GA felt threatened, justified or not, the GA could invoke the refusal to transport clause.

It is not blaming the victim. But when OP's actions may have made the situation deteriorating. OP then was no longer a victim, but a participant of a nonsense.

(FWIW - there are at least 2 ways to know an employee without asking - nametag and airport access badge. Personally, if I was in OP's shoe, I would still be able to make a legitimate complaint even without the need of the employee's name. In fact, many travelers were able to make routine complaints even without the employees' name.)

It has nothing to do with whether we are sheep or we live in totalitarian countries or not. It is about making an educated decision.

GAs are not always right, and passengers are not always wrong. But because the GA has overwhelming authority, i.e. refuse to transport, any confrontation can be seen as a threat to air safety, effectively giving an excuse to exercise the refusal.

I never say a passenger should not effect a complaint when things go wrong. I never say a passenger should keep the mouth shut. But there is always a right time to do right things. Vice versa, there is always a wrong time to do wrong things.

This incident could be easily avoided. If OP paid attention to the BP, OP could identify the problem before boarding. If fixable, a GA can fix the problem at the time of check-in until boarding. Before the escalation, OP can simply walk away and file a complaint later on. To me, it is a classic Murphy's law - anything that can go wrong have gone wrong.

Sean Peever

What you mean you get on before you get on? And let's talk about getting on the plane, no thank you, evel knievel can get on the plane, I'm getting in the plane!

I miss him! So much! I got to see him live about a dozen times and he was just fantastic.

Davvidd

Forget about the zone in the boarding card. Shouldn't the GA know what privileges what card holders get for AC?
He could have politely declined or he could have let them go. It's his decision of shouting ( I am going by the OPs statement here) that escalated the whole issue.

Sandeep1

That's not the protocol. I've never seen anyone flashing their CC to get priority boarding.

canadiancow

Zone 2 when traveling on an Aeroplan redemption booked out of the primary cardholder's account.

It's not even clear to me if it's possible for a GA to look up the primary cardholder, but the rest would take way too long during the boarding process.

RangerNS

When the boarding process has begun you have 3 seconds to deal with the GA, at most.

OP had ample casual time to address his issue. His issue. Surgeons, who have several years more training get you to sharpie your own knees, because humans are humans and whatever the result of the lawsuit may be, the surgeon will still have the correct legs at the end of the day.

HerpaYvr

No!

A couple of times I stopped and chatted with the Lounge Dragons and discussed the numerous credit cards, clubs, airlines that provide lounge access. So many options out there and the lounge dragons deal with these folks who have plenty of time and the system shows what is valid and what is not with pictures. At the gate, they do not have plenty of time.

As a "real" frequent flyer and you earned Zone 2 boarding as a E50/E75 do you really want a guy who flies once in a while in front of you because of a credit card access! It's a horrible system as you have to be on an Aeroplan ticket and with the primary cardholder who gate agents have no idea who they may be.

Never a reason to be rude, always find a way to be nice and yet try to communicate effectively and that sometimes means changing our approach.

Davvidd

I don't know about AC but certainly SQ teach their staff to learn what privileges passengers get depending on their status and cards.

yscleo

Thanks for the comments and suggestions. I'm learning a few things.

Some people said I had plenty of time to check the BP and could've gotten it rectified. I did have prior experiences of the BPs not printing zone 2 properly. When I did ask the check-in agents before, they all said they cannot do anything, they cannot change it to zone 2 even though they know the rules and agree I should get zone 2. Some suggested that at the gate, I show the CC and the gate agent may let us through. That what I did (showed the card) and in the past the gate agents did let me/us through. In this case, the male agent was rude, shouted, and waved his arm telling us to go line up there.

The female agent did wear a name tag that I could read clear, but not the male agent. The male agent did wear a badge around his neck but it showed the flip side, so it is not clear what badge he was wearing.

The male agent later also said he worked as a priority agent for 5-6 years. What is a priority agent?

jugaadkabaap

The AC benefits are guarenteed as long as you are a card holder. The issue comes in on how AC & AE (Aeroplan) systems / policies implement this benefit.

When a cobranded card is issued to a customer, it is added to his/her AE profile. All subsequent AE redemptions are tagged with a special marked AE *CC or similar. This marker tells the systems that he is an AE CC holder and provide benefits including zone 2 and lounge access.

However,

• if your AE card is fairly new (that is system has not processed mapping it to your AE profile) OR
• when your AE reservation is modified - ie, by default your AE redemptions have your AE number - but if you modify it to another *A like UA and then change it back to AE - the marker is Lost permanently and the new BP will be zone 4/5 or whatever.
• your reservation is made way before the AE card is added to your profile - in this case usually when BP is generated if the system has your AE Card - the marker will be active but in some cases it fails.

In all these cases, there won't be AE CC marker & the benefits can get declined. However, the T&C of the benefits doesn't enforce or speak about this technical cluster ****. The T&C states, as long as you are primary card holder of cobranded CC AND you are traveling on AE redemption AND the ticket is issued in your name.

As long as these 3 are met - the benefits should be granted by AC. Further the terms state ". To access priority check-in and priority boarding, the Primary Cardholder may be required to show their TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite Card to the Air Canada agent."

I am sorry but your comparison makes no sense. All benefits on TD / CIBC Cards are benefits assured by AC and NOT Aeroplan / TD. AC contractually agree to provide these benefits to the card holder and IT IS INDEED AC's responsibility to ensure these.

Quoting "All Air Canada benefits are fulfilled in whole or in part by Air Canada, or its designated affiliates or other third parties, and are subject to change at any time. The Toronto-Dominion Bank and its affiliates are not responsible for fulfilling these benefits. For more details about these benefits, please contact Air Canada directly."

As a representative of AC - the GA was at wrong (considering one side of story thats posted here).

That is indeed the protocol ; as explained earlier - as long as you are satisfying the criteria - you should be given Zone 2 boarding. There were many times the marker was missed from my BP - because at times i play around with the FF # (beyond scope of this discussion) and multiple times i flashed my AE Card to get Zone 2 & it was always granted.