Seeking Second Opinion: Delta Out of Toronto (Canada)
 

Hi FT'ers,

I know the answer is obvious - Go back to Air Canada/United (Star Alliance) but I am hoping to get a second (and seasoned) opinion from other FT'ers who live in Toronto (or Canada for that matter.)

So I've been stationed out of Toronto over the past few years, and it looks like I will be sticking around for a while. Star Alliance was always my choice of airlines, but business trips landed me on a Skyteam flight, so I stuck with Delta for the past while. While doing some comparison shopping between Delta (SkyTeam) and Air Canada/United (or Star Alliance) economically, apples to apples, Star alliance is often cheaper, and also resulted in shorter flight times, and much fewer connections. More so, they happen to fly to places I want to (and need to) go to more often than Delta or SkyTeam airlines do.

It's too early for me to say good bye to Delta as I do like the overall service (they've treated me very well) but financially, I'm not sure if they are sustainable. There have been instances where I've found flights with Delta so rock bottom, you there was no way to beat them, but I'm unsure if this was a one-off or normal. Hoping some seasoned Delta/SkyTeam flyers out of Toronto/YYZ could chime in. Thanks in advance!

Regards,

bcrdukes

What does the expanding WestJet alliance do for your 'Delta' flying?

I've found the same as well - insanely cheap or insanely expensive on DL!

I would like to think that I fly often enough where the elite tiers makes sense more so with Air Canada. I will easily hit the 25K mark, and likely 35K, but 50K is often iffy. I will be taking enough TPAC and TATL flights over the next few years, but hitting that 50K may require a handful of mileage runs. Even with Silver Medallion, Delta has taken very good care of me. Air Canada, not so much. And I was a die-hard AC loyalist/customer and 50K'er for a handful of years.

Little to nothing, unfortunately. It's actually more expensive. :p

Do you mean you think the airline isn't financially stable? If so, that's nothing further from the truth. DL is also the most on time airline. Also when things happen generally their best at helping get you where you need to be.

YYZ pricing can be weird. Theres two main facfors, the CAD being where it is and competition, there's multiple airlines competing for passengers. Generally I find DL/WS to be the lowest and quickest combo for transborder flights. Partner China Eastern always has great J fares to China, Asia, and Australia/New Zealand.

Sorry, I should have clarified.

Financially as in most economical for me as a consumer. Case in point - it's $400'ish R/T on AC vs. $600+ on DL to fly to LAX where my family is. It has been like this consistently for the past 5 months. Same for going to HKG, SIN, TPE, AMS, FRA, CDG, and DEL, BOM, BLR. I got lucky on Jet Airways once from YYZ with a stopover in AMS, and then off to BLR, and the same back, hence why I stuck with DL. AC (at the time) was cost prohibitive, so my employer said no to the Star Alliance flights (Air Canada and Lufthansa.)

I haven't given China Eastern any thought, to be honest. I will be heading over to Asia at least three times this year, and the DL flights are just punishing, cost wise, and with the number of layovers.

MU flights IMO are great value. Fly them out of YYZ regularly due to pricing. Enjoy the service. DL regularly has either YYZ-DTW-PVG or PEK in J at around USD2200 or so. Lately it seems to be PEK that gets the low price.

I am based in Buffalo, but often fly out of Toronto internationally, because of non-stops and better pricing to Europe. DL often lowers cost to compete with AC, and I have loved the service on KLM and AF as partners. I find that DL is not competitive out of Toronto going to far-east, however.

Many Canadians fly out of Buffalo for travel to US. You could do better to fly to LAX, especially if purchased far in advance. And JetBlue has added non-stop from BUF to LAX.

I'm in Toronto 5-6 times a year, either for work or repositioning for a long-haul flight on Delta because the airfares for the routes I fly are generally 35–50% lower out of Toronto than Detroit. I find Delta long-haul flights originating out of Toronto to be much cheaper than Detroit and marginally cheaper than Chicago. For example, last year, there were a lot of paid first-class deals to Hawaii originating in Toronto.

I haven't had any real bad experiences, although not having a Sky Club is an inconvenience. The generic lounge accessible with Priority Pass is sufficient to pass time, although the food sucks. The only other inconvenience is having to carry your own luggage to the baggage check and then not having anyone lift it up for you.

Cincinnati, too, right?

I am a Delta diamond based in YYZ.

- The lounge issue outlined above was solved about a year ago. There is a brand new Priority Pass lounge serving hot food in terminal 3. It used to be a sad terminal, but they recently opened a new food court with some nice options.
- Terminal 3 is much faster curb to gate than Terminal 1.
- You can use Skymiles on Westjet flights, so there is plenty of options there. I have used them for YYZ-LAS and YYZ-London at 15k and 25k direct respectively.

I spoke about the lounge in my post. It's still very weak in terms of food. Booze is fairly typical with the wine being from Niagara (as local as it gets). The lounge is, however, very small. It gets crowded.