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No online flight schedule/timetable?

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Old Mar 4, 2019, 7:28 pm
  #1  
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No online flight schedule/timetable?

I want to check WS's schedule for a particular city pair and it seems the only function now is to dump you to a page that shows destinations for a particular city but only shows useless information such as "Daily" or "Y X weekly". Can one not get all the flights on a particular day to display regardless of whether seats are being sold or not?
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 7:52 pm
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This site is generally good for determining which airline flies where: WestJet (WS) flight index
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 8:05 pm
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Originally Posted by aerobod
This site is generally good for determining which airline flies where: WestJet (WS) flight index
That website may not be useful if you're looking in advance, or want to check the flight some one could be travelling on, full or not,

You'd think WS would have an online timetable. Most airlines do.
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 8:29 pm
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
That website may not be useful if you're looking in advance, or want to check the flight some one could be travelling on, full or not
if you know how to use it, it covers all routes for all airlines publishing to GDSs, currently until 31 Aug 2019, doesn’t matter if the flight is full or not.
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 9:10 pm
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Originally Posted by aerobod

if you know how to use it, it covers all routes for all airlines publishing to GDSs, currently until 31 Aug 2019, doesn’t matter if the flight is full or not.
Most people won;t know this exists. Why does WS not make one available on the website?
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 9:27 pm
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
Most people won;t know this exists. Why does WS not make one available on the website?
Probably as it is not a format that is much in demand any more, so not worth publishing. A search of flights on the booking site gives people all the available flights, if the flight isn’t available due to being full then there is no point in showing it’s details. Anybody wanting to see all flight statuses can query the 3-day view (yesterday, today, tomorrow).
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 10:20 pm
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Originally Posted by aerobod

Probably as it is not a format that is much in demand any more, so not worth publishing. A search of flights on the booking site gives people all the available flights, if the flight isn’t available due to being full then there is no point in showing it’s details. Anybody wanting to see all flight statuses can query the 3-day view (yesterday, today, tomorrow).
Poor shoddy excuse. Doesn't have to be printed. Just a matter of some IT programming.
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Old Mar 4, 2019, 10:28 pm
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
Poor shoddy excuse. Doesn't have to be printed. Just a matter of some IT programming.
No excuse, just a postulation.There’s probably someone out there who would like it chiselled on a stone tablet, too, or people who prefer phone books to locate people, even if in an electronic form Sometimes the market has just dwindled to the point that it’s time to retire the “old way”.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 6:14 am
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
Poor shoddy excuse. Doesn't have to be printed. Just a matter of some IT programming.
Air Canada's is usually out of sync with the booking engine... I imagine it's the same with most airlines. Just do a faux booking, you will see the schedule.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 10:25 am
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Originally Posted by YXUFlyboy
Air Canada's is usually out of sync with the booking engine... I imagine it's the same with most airlines. Just do a faux booking, you will see the schedule.
Again, not if the flight is full. Say, for example, I tell someone today that I will be arriving on WS Friday mid/late afternoon from X, they will go to the WS site and find no such flight (assuming the flight is still fully sold).

I did a check and the only airlines that I am flying in the upcoming weeks that don't have such schedules are AirAsiaX and MalindoAir. However, AirAsia does show fully-sold flights as unavailable when doing a faux booking. Have not found a Malindo flight that is sold out to determine if it is still shown or not.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 10:50 am
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
Again, not if the flight is full. Say, for example, I tell someone today that I will be arriving on WS Friday mid/late afternoon from X, they will go to the WS site and find no such flight (assuming the flight is still fully sold).

I did a check and the only airlines that I am flying in the upcoming weeks that don't have such schedules are AirAsiaX and MalindoAir. However, AirAsia does show fully-sold flights as unavailable when doing a faux booking. Have not found a Malindo flight that is sold out to determine if it is still shown or not.

If you gave the person your flight number then whether the flight is full or not would not be an issue. Also they can access the flight status option 24 hours prior to departure and it would show all the options.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 10:56 am
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Originally Posted by YVR Cockroach
Again, not if the flight is full. Say, for example, I tell someone today that I will be arriving on WS Friday mid/late afternoon from X, they will go to the WS site and find no such flight (assuming the flight is still fully sold).
All they need is the flight number to get accurate information, type it into Google for the easiest access to info for any airline, no need to navigate to find a timetable. The Air Canada timetable is only updated twice a year, so is only a guide to flights as YXUFlyboy said, so is not a source of up-to-date information. Westjet as with many airlines and other sites such as Google and OTAs these days pull information for flight status and times for their mobile apps from external sources such as FlightAware and FlightStats, this then enables a single data source for codeshare and operated flights.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 12:10 pm
  #13  
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Originally Posted by Ace Cdn
If you gave the person your flight number then whether the flight is full or not would not be an issue. Also they can access the flight status option 24 hours prior to departure and it would show all the options.
Hypothetically. It could be someone else telling me they're flying to Y and they're travelling and incommunicado for the duration. I would give flight details but a lot of people are not into that or don't think about it.

I'd also like more than a day's notice to plan a trip, or make an offer to give them a ride (we avoid going to the airport at certain times of the day.due to unpleasant traffic).

No need to make excuses for WS..
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 12:15 pm
  #14  
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Originally Posted by aerobod
All they need is the flight number to get accurate information, type it into Google for the easiest access to info for any airline, no need to navigate to find a timetable. The Air Canada timetable is only updated twice a year, so is only a guide to flights as YXUFlyboy said, so is not a source of up-to-date information. Westjet as with many airlines and other sites such as Google and OTAs these days pull information for flight status and times for their mobile apps from external sources such as FlightAware and FlightStats, this then enables a single data source for codeshare and operated flights.
That is assuming 1) one trusts Google for this information (I don't), and 2) people actually know about those external sites and apps (I prefer to get it from the proverbial horse's mouth), and 3) have a phone that can run the apps (all mine are obsolete and/or no longer supported).

As for Point 2, I would say that most people would go to the most-authoritative source (i.e., the airline) for this info.

WS could fix this by showing fully-sold flights as AirAsia does. Pity WS's IT is too poor and shoddy to do so.
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Old Mar 5, 2019, 12:27 pm
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I wouldn’t say anyone is making excuses for WestJet, but a lot of us don’t see the problem when there are clear alternative workarounds. This forum is filled with frequent flyers, if this was a major inconvenience there would be multiple people agreeing with you. As of yet, there’s none. Calling WS’ IT department poor or shoddy over something like this is kind of laughable.

As others have said, if you’re trying to plan a pick up at the airport sharing a flight number should be a no brainer. I don’t get why some people “wouldn’t be in to that”.
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