Is this a Cancellation or a Credit?
 

Hi all,
I've got a flight to India on March 31, and I'm cancelling for obvious reasons. Because Air Canada has changed my flight multiple times (and because of COVID), they say they allow cancellation. Thankfully, I'm able to click 'Cancel Booking' from the My Bookings list. However, I can't tell if they're offering a credit or full refund onto my credit card. Can someone help me interpret? On the one hand, it says "$2093.86 will be credited to the original form of payment.", which implies refund onto my credit card. On the other hand, it says "Keep the total amount for a future trip", which implies credit. Help!

It's a mixed-class booking, with the flight there being Premium Economy (Lowest) and the flight back being Economy - Standard.

Thanks!

Is it giving you a choice between the two?

No - no choice. The big red button says "Keep the total amount for a future trip ($2093.86)". That's all I can click. However the box above says ( (i) $2093.86 will be credited to the original form of payment).

Welcome to FT, by the way :)

This is strange. What changes, exactly, did they make to your flight?

Multiple changes - delays in arrival and departure by an hour or two, and then change in the connecting airport (previously Dubai, now Frankfurt).

I think Air Canada still has it that for non-refundable tickets, you only get the option to keep the total amount for a future trip. Hopefully it'll change and Air Canada will do the right thing in refunding every ticket no matter what.

So getting that ambiguous message saying the amount "will be credited to the original form of payment" is probably just a temporary inconsistency.

Yeah - that's what I figured based on the Big Red Button that I didn't want to press. Thanks for your help! I'm thinking that in the next 14 days, they will cancel all international flights anyway, and just refund my money. What crazy, crazy times!

Related to this, is Air Canada giving full refunds if we do self service cancellation at aircanada.com?

Possibly. Depends on the circumstances.

AC Cancels = Refund No?
 

I cancelled my non-refundable outbound to FLL for 26 Mar and took the taxes back option since insurance will be paying for the diff. I had the option of cancel and get taxes or cancel and get future credit for the entire amount including taxes. I then went to cancel my non-refundable inbound (different PNR) from FLL 7 April and was only presented the get future credit option. Again I would claim the diff if I only got my taxes back with insurance but I didn't have the option. Exited the booking and then went back in with the same results (only future credit) except AC shows they cancelled my flight this time and to call them to make arrangements. Oh what a joy that will be. I thought since they cancelled I should get the option for a return of all of the funds and not have to commit to a future credit. Are they trying to trick clients to accept a future credit instead of paying out the ticket?

If they cancelled the flight, you should be eligible for a full refund.

When it comes to AC's IT setup, there are many things that don't work properly, so bear in mind Hanlon's Razor.

I'm in the same boat where one of the two flights in the booking got cancelled and I obviously assumed it would result in a full refund. I'm still only seeing the option to get a future credit. Was it announced anywhere official that even for non-refundable tickets, if Air Canada had cancelled the flight, that it'd be eligible for a full refund?

I had a routing of YYZ-ZRH-BOM; KBP-FRA-YYZ

Under the normal goodwill policy they were giving me the option of either keeping the full amount for a future trip or take a refund with the $300 cancellation fee. I just waited until one of the flights got cancelled (I was suspecting the first to be cancelled would be the Swiss air flight from ZRH-BOM, but it ended up being Lufthansa's KBP-FRA that got canned first).

Once the flight was cancelled I was able to go in and cancel the trip and get a full refund to original form of payment. Funny enough it said the refund would take up to 3 weeks, but it only ended up taking a few days. I can't recall whether the cancellation thing had any language about future trips like yours does - as I recall it just said refund to original form of payment.

Good for you! :) You're sure it wasn't a refundable ticket to begin with though?