24left

We really need a thread for this. From our friends over at The Beaverton (satire for those not familiar)

Air Canada promises to refund tickets with your money

QUOTES:

OTTAWA – After a deal was reached to provide Air Canada with a $5.9 billion aid package, a spokesperson for the company announced they would allow refunds for tickets now that they can use your money.

......The deal was decried by some Air Canada workers, who chose to remain anonymous.

“So they’re using our money to give them money, but not our money to give us money, but they give us less money than they should, but the government won’t give us our money, or tell them how much of our money they should give us?” Said one flight attendant."

😂

Full post
https://www.thebeaverton.com/2021/04...th-your-money/

eyeball1

I have a AC travel voucher for a flight that was partially paid for with an AC ecoupon. So if I request a refund to original form of payment will AC issue a new ecoupon for that part of the travel voucher?

On Time Reports

Usually it goes back to the same ecoupon. Even though it is a ecoupon, you can check the balance as if you had a gift card. So after a few days, go to https://aircanada.buyatab.com/custom...ada/index.html and scroll down to the bottom to check your balance.

Mrgooger

I always come here to find out the best things to do around Air Canada. I really appreciate this community around its passion for flying, travel and each other. I fly for business and pleasure but I don't have the expertise many of you do around travel, Aeroplan and AC. I've searched high and low around refund/points and vouchers but all I get are posts about the class action suit.

So Air Canada is offering me:
-a refund (two flights one $1250, one $1100) on my credit card
-a bunch of points - like 62,000 for one flight and 55,000 for the other so total of 110,000 aeroplan miles
-a travel voucher with no expiration date.

I'm trying to figure out what the best option to take is. Caveat - I don't need the money back on my CC at this point really...I mean I'd good to take it, but also happy to hold in points or vouchers IF that makes sense. I guess I'm really asking about option #2 the points. Are they worth it? Is that extra bump in points meaningful (65%?). I'd be happy to pass on a full refund if you'all think the points are a good bet, or perhaps the voucher is (but why not just refund CC and buy whatever ticket I wanted in the future - seems like they could have added an upgrade credit to the voucher to make it more appealing).

I'm not sure when I'm going to fly again but I do know our family is going somewhere in 2022...maybe several somewhere's lol. I'm gonna live life fun and fast after this gong show of a pandemic.

I'm a 35K aeroplan member with one 35K to gift to my wife. I have about 50,000 points right now.

Hope everyone is keeping safe and thanks in advance for you expertise, and support.

MG

expert7700

My opinion is $ back to credit card is best in the vast majority of cases.
Unless you were already buying and redeeming hundreds of thousands of points anyways.

The other options are there to entice people to choose the cheaper (for AC) option.

Aeroplan recently changed to a dynamic points cost, so by having points you give up control of pricing and could feel boxed into a certain schedule of carrier, destinations, dates, or nonpreferred times/extra or overnight connections. Guess when peak travel & highest point redemption demand will be? Right after Covid into 2022.

exception would really only seem if you have a very specific use/trip in mind that you can see the point cost vs cash cost, and better yet book immediately.

Some on here treat Aeroplan bonus points as more enticing than a credit.... But I'd be hard pressed to say more enticing than a refund. I think a majority of us that do so use them to redeem for J/F cabin international travel on non-North American carriers.
​​​​​
EDIT to also add that points can be devalued anytime. A major US carrier just increased redemption rate 6% across the board with no notice this week. Hurt me a bit.
​​​​​​

Adam Smith

I've merged your thread here because this is the general thread on refunds vs credits, not just for the class action (which is likely now moot).

Cash is king. Take the refund.

There's zero incentive to take the voucher. Unlike some European airlines, which have been offering a small bonus (e.g. €50) to take a future travel credit, AC offers nothing. So rule that one out quickly.

The value of the points is not great. A 65% bonus equates to a cost of about 1.8 cents per mile. There are far cheaper ways to acquire points, e.g. credit card sign-up bonuses. AC has also recently sold points with up to 100% bonus (late March/April) and up to 80% bonus (February).

Can you get decent value out of buying points for 1.8 cpm? Sure, and if you had an itinerary in mind that you wanted to book right away that generated more value than that, maybe it would make sense. But if you're not going to use the points right away, why do it? You tie up your cash with AC with no guarantee as to what value you'll be able to extract when you go to redeem the points.

If you get a refund, you can do whatever you want with that cash.

SacCalFlyer

I wouldn't have known I could dispute the CC charge, so even if the government hadn't come through, it probably would've had a happy ending helped by you guys. Not to mention, I'd have never heard of the policy change if not for the posts here.

There was an option to hang up & get a call back -- they called back after around 45 minutes. Once they called, the person was very nice and helpful (so different from last time!). (It did take a bit of effort to actually get into the right phone queue initially, so they're still not making it super easy to get refunds.)

FlY2XS

Does anyone have any specific feedback for the following? (I have long since forgotten the particulars, and don't have the time to dig up all the threads pertitinent to the history)
My brother booked flights out to see my parents Feb 8 2020, for travel in April but then with Covid and military restrictions, he was forced to cancel.
He accepted a credit. Now with my father's status deteriorating significantly he was granted compassionate leave just recently. AC told him that his credit is already expired after 12 months when he called 2 weeks ago.
I was surprised, thinking that all credits had been extended automatically, but he was told that since he didn't apply for the new voucher that he was SOL. I don't remember the timing holding to this strict schedule post COVID, but I was also keeping track of my deadlines over the past 12 months so I am not sure.
I wondered too if the new AC gov't deal might be an out and suggested a new call.
Any recall of the initial T&C dates and insights into the new refund policy would be greatly appreciated.

phrekyos

Chase resolved one of the disputes in my favor today, the one where Air Canada did not reply. I'm still waiting to hear back on the other one.

ChrisA330

check this thread: Master thread COVID-19/Coronavirus; travel waivers, route changes, AC impacts

The new refund policy is clearly outlined on AC.com. Did you read it?

farnorthtrader

Pretty clear that Ac can refund quickly when they want to (when they have gotten the government cash they have been whining about for the last year).
I cancelled due to COVID at the end of March last year (ticket through points in a reward program). Was given a credit to be used through the reward program, first by December 2020, then extended to two years. Applied to AC to switch it to the more flexible credit at the beginning of December, and heard nothing for more than 4 months because there just was no way that they could process credits any faster. Now that they got their hands on my taxpayer money, I contact the rewards program, they contact AC and within 24 hours I have all of my points back. What a bunch of crooks!

NEN86

So i applied for the refund of my AC flight vouchers last week on Tues 13th, got an email back on Friday 16th saying the following;

'We’re pleased to let you know that your refund has now been processed back to your original form of payment. Please allow one or two billing cycles for this transaction to appear on your credit card statement.'

Firstly im shocked it got processed so quickly, but can any one confirm the 'one or two billing cycles' part? i paid by my mastercard debit card, not a credit card, so there is no billing cycles. I would like to think it would be fairly quick to see the funds in my account since AC have processes/sent the funds, but anyone got any idea of how long it should take?

THank you

ACfly

Put my refund claim last week, and surprised to see my refund credited to my credit card this week.

Adam Smith

Should be a matter of a few days, realistically.

guessaaa

When were your original flight dates? I submitted a form on Tuesday morning for a voucher for flights in December 2020 and for an AC cancelled itinerary for April 2021. I've received nothing to date, I can't even check the status until a week has gone by. They say they're prioritizing refunds by flight dates.