seanp7

The YYZ Signature lounge is excellent. Better than the Polaris lounge for food. I would have no hesitation booking NYC-YYZ-XXX on AC J. I like the flat bed & service; but I've never experienced deflate-gate. Food on board is average.

As noted in a post above, transit US-International at YYZ is easy these days.

Polytonic

MLL in LAX isn't bad. I think the food there is better than the UC options.

Honestly, it seems as if you're making a mountain out of a molehill when it comes to IRROPS, but maybe you fly a lot more than me, and more often in a higher class of service. I'm pretty much hardcore deep discount economy, so I take what I can get. I can't say that AC has let me down yet.

As for agency, I'm pretty sure bocastephen is his (or her) own TA. Some days, I am tempted to go through a TA, but the thought of giving out a credit card and personal information to someone on a forum seems a bit far out for me personally, plus I feel like I've learned quite a bit taking care of this stuff on my own.

I've never been in a Polaris Lounge. I have YYZ-YVR-HND right now, but if I wasn't meeting people on a certain day, I probably would have pushed for YYZ-HND and arrived one day later instead.

seat38a

Really??? With less than 50% ontime rate in the winter is making a mountain out of a mole hole? It is literally a flipping a coin to see if your going to be ontime or late! Then add in the dismal rebooking / customer service to that.

rankourabu

its 55.4% .. Rank #156/162 (from OAG)

bocastephen

My own, I'm an agent and book J deals for other members who don't want the hassle of dealing with airline or ITA websites and not easily finding the segments they want.

For the AC seats, I actually deflate mine on purpose because I find the AC seat is too hard at the normal setting so I let it go soft and add the mattress cover and it's comfortable for me - but others might prefer a firmer mattress.

seat38a

I think I'll take the nasty egg white sandwich and snack basket in domestic first from anyone of the US3 to that! And I thought Chinese carriers were the ones with crappy OTP from what I've heard but those numbers are better than AC by a hugh margin.

whitethunder

one thing to consider, I see a lot of complaints that say during IRROPS if it was on UA I would call the 1K line and I would be rebooked in 10 mins etc, I wonder if an AC SE (equivalent of UA 1K) has these kinds of issues.

I wonder if the AC SE has a number that can get them all rebooked etc in 10 mins, most of us have UA status, I have not called a normal UA ## in 10 years so I wonder if that is slanting the IRROPS opinions a little ??

Would be nice to hear from a current AC SE instead of those of us, myself included, who have no status on AC and only fly a handful of AC flights a year...

IAH-OIL-TRASH

I think I'd rather hear the voice of current AC customer service agent answering the phone when I call AC instead reading what an AC SE has to say here

seat38a

During irrops on United, I've called in as a mere silver and was on hold for less than 5 minutes.

sinoflyer

I had a LAX-HKG-CPT trip on CX this week, purchased directly from CX during their "Black Friday" sale last fall. When the coronavirus happened, CX began canceling flights left and right. CX also published a "Special Ticketing Guidelines for HKG," which waives rebooking and rerouting fees for many types of itineraries, including those transiting through HKG.

My HKG-CPT flight first disappeared from the PNR 2 weeks ago. I was rebooked HKG-JNB-CPT (CX +Comair). HKG-JNB got canceled a few days later as well, so I decided not to tempt fate and to postpone my trip to May. When I phoned CX to reschedule, the agent said that my ticket needed to be re-fared because the LAX-CPT ticket was no longer "valid" after CX prematurely canceled the route a month before the original end date. Under normal circumstances, I might understand why CX would stick with their rigid fare rules; however, with all the stuff going on right now, I expected a little more empathy from CX toward pax who wish to reschedule even during a whole host of uncertainties.

I was eventually able to reschedule a JNB trip in May using my original ticket, but the effort took 2 phone calls (100 minutes wait time total), one trip to LAX (time spent driving in traffic, but no wait at the counter because the midnight LAX-HKG flight that day was only 30% full), 1 email the next morning to the CX reservation center in Vancouver, and 2 subsequent phone conversations with a "supervisor" who then relayed my request to Hong Kong HQ. The total time span was 2.5 days. On UA, when irrops or cancelations happened, I could expect to have my trip rebooked/rerouted/reticketed within 30 minutes and with just 1 phone call.

I've said this many times in the past: U.S. carriers, including UA, have a competitive and even superior product vis-a-vis the supposedly vaunted Asian carriers like CX because of the ridiculous rigmarole that the latter are liable to subject their customers to when things don't go exactly right.

bocastephen

I think you just got unlucky with a bad phone agent who sent your rebooking down into a rabbit hole. Certain airlines, specifically those who offshore their call centers to India (SQ and BA in particular) have this problem because of the cultural issues that plague Indian call centers in terms of being unable to think for themselves or do anything except follow a strict script or flow chart.

This is why using an agent - it doesn't have to be me, but any competent agent - will insulate you from all of this mess, as doing this rebooking would have taken me 15-20 mins of typing provided the agency waiver allowed for a flexible rebooking policy. When folks are doing these expensive J class trips, unless you have priority status with the airline that you're flying, booking direct or via a OTA is just asking for trouble when something goes sideways and can make a mess of a pricy trip.

As a 1K flying United, I know exactly how to handle an IRROP situation and the most likely outcome - as a *G flying someone else, the result is a complete crapshoot.

canadiancow

I can get through instantly, and during IRROPS get rebooked on whatever has space.

I have a UA*G friend who was booked in P class on AC, and after a delay posted on his first segment, he was protected on a UA option "automatically" (I don't know if it was a system or a person, but it was not asked for).

Concierge-eligible itineraries get special attention in IRROPS.

seat38a

Wow you win.

HNLbasedFlyer

I'm still trying to wrap my head around 55.4% on-time arrival rate - that is just appalling.

JimInOhio

It's really something the *A needs to step up to and address. You can't provide all of these alleged benefits across the network and then treat *G passengers like dirt as soon as something goes wrong and they need help.