gglave

My family has (had?) a Westjet booking YYZ-YQB return in mid-February.

Westjet has cancelled the flights we were on - And put us on an outbound flight twelve hours earlier & the day before and put us on a return flight twelve hours earlier as well, costing us a day in Quebec city.

These flights do not work for us.

My reading of the Canadian Air Passenger Protection Regulations (APPR), indicates that Westjet is required to put us on Air Canada or Porter flights that align with our original booking, as these flights are cancelled.

Westjet is refusing to do this, stating that they are not obligated as this is just a "schedule change." Our only options are these unacceptable flights or a full refund, and if we take the refund and book on the competition we'll be out over $1000, due to an increase in ticket prices since our original booking.

When the flights are entirely new flight numbers departing 12 hours earlier I'm not sure how it can be considered a "schedule change."

I have no status with Westjet.

1) Has anyone successfully gotten Westjet to put you on the competition based on the APPR rules in a situation like this? What language did you use / how did you force their hand?

2) I assume the federal regulator is useless here and it would take months to resolve through them?

3) If we take the refund and buy tickets on Air Canada, do you think it is worth suing Westjet in small claims for their $1000+ for failing to follow the law?

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

tcook052

Does APPR apply to airline schedule changes well in advance? I thought it was regarding flight delays and or cancellations while passengers are en route along with overbooking and denied boarding.

V1213

It's an interesting situation because it runs into some interesting language in the APPR.

For starters, it sounds like 12(3)(c) applies to you:

As such, Section 17 applies:
As I read that, WestJet can get you to YQB within 9 hours on their own metal. Since they aren't doing that, they need to either book you on someone else within 48 hours of your original ticket, or get you to another airport and fly you from there. The weird part is the 9 hours vs 48 hours, in which case the 12 hours from WestJet could be the better option. Either way, if Section 17 does in fact apply to your situation, they should be offering flights on any carrier.

If WestJet won't play ball, https://formulaires-forms.otc-cta.gc...avel-complaint is where to go to complain and get the APPR enforced.

FlyerJ

No. When an airline makes a schedule change months in advance, the APPR does not "require" them to give you flights on another airline that better suit your plans. Absolutely not. They offered you a full refund if you choose not to accept the schedule change. That's all that you're owed.

As tcook052 said, the whole point of the APPR is, essentially, protecting passengers in the case of flight disruptions during travel. It covers cancellations, delays and denied boarding while en route. It definitely does not cover long term schedule changes that might impact travel that's purchased months in advance. (Whether or not the APPR or some other consumer protection legislation should cover those circumstances could be a good debate. But the fact is that, today, it's not covered.)

As for your threat to sue WestJet, nothing that they're doing is "not following the law". As frustrating as it may be, this happens with every single airline all the time. We typically plan and purchase our leisure travel many, many months in advance (often when they go on sale, almost a year in advance) -- and schedules, routes, destinations will almost always change. We plan our travel far in advance knowing that there's risk, and knowing that we need to watch for schedule changes, and knowing that we might need to pivot our plans once airline schedules are finalized. That's just how it goes. The only legal remedy that you're owed is the full refund that they've already offered.

aerobod

The APPR applies 14 days or less in advance of the flight, anything earlier than that can be covered in the way that WS has covered for the OP, based on their tariff (i.e. alternate flights or full refund is fine): https://rppa-appr.ca/eng/compensatio...-cancellations

V1213

I'm not an APPR expert, but the APPR does specifically have sections that specifically refer to passengers being notified less than 12 hours before travel (eg. 12(2)(b)), and sections that refer to passengers being notified 14 days or less before departure (eg. 12(3)(d)). These sections clearly refer to issues before travel occurs and, in addition, there are sections relating to advertising and sale of flights (eg. 25-31), which also don't refer to currently-occurring travel. As far as I can see, there are no overriding statements or definition that would limit the applicability of the regulations to travel currently or soon to occur.

On Time Reports

The issue here is that WS only flies to YQB once daily in February. But if you contact them again you should be able to have them rebook you so you depart on the same day. So basically yes they were right either accept the change or get a full refund since there is only one daily departure to YQB in WestJet's network in February.

hoipolloi

The 14 days limitation applies to compensation for inconvenience following a delay or cancellation. The rest (being rebooked on alternative airline if necessary) still applies even if notice of schedule change resulting in a delay of arrival to destination was communicated well in advance.

https://rppa-appr.ca/eng/rebooking-a...r-cancellation

aerobod

This summary doesn’t provide all the wording of the legislation, if you step through the rules laid out in the legislation, the only remedy required for a trip that hasn’t already started is the requirement for a full refund if the change or cancellation is more than 14 days in advance.

aerobod

Also, looking through the EU261 legislation for a comparison, re-routing and compensation are only mandatory for 14 days or less notification before an outbound trip. If more than 14 days before a trip starts, the airline can offer a full refund, earliest possible alternative flights, or a new ticket at a later date of your choosing (subject to availability), the consumer gets to choose a full refund or any alternative the airline may offer, with the airline required to process the refund within 7 days if that is what the consumer picks.

hoipolloi

I read the full legislation and doesn't say what you claim for changes made more than 14 days before departure that result in a delays. Can you point to the applicable sections/paragraphs?

aerobod

Nothing is, it seems, it refers to the airline tariff for terms and conditions, they are the starting point for claims and compensation (see section 2). In terms of delays and cancellations it only provides remedies for 14 days or less and completion of a trip when it has already started (lots of language around completing trips, implying they are underway), no remedies for trips that have not started and are more than 14 days in the future. Basically modelled on the change and cancel remedies provided in EU261. From a legal perspective, my lawyer friends have discussed in the past that because a case isn't explicitly covered (i.e. in this case explicitly more than 14 days and trip not started), doesn't mean it applies, it just doesn't exist in the legislation.

hoipolloi

There needs to be some kind of recourse against airlines who offer attractive fares to various destinations well in advance to get people's moneys then cancel flights that didn't fill up enough at like 3 weeks in advance (what's called throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks, or bait&switch), leaving travellers with no option but to get a refund and try to book something close-in at more expensive close-in fares with other airlines

nli007

The problem with the APPR - as it's currently written - is its ambiguity. For one, the term "cancellation" is never defined in the APPR (unlike EC261 where the term cancellation is clearly defined under Article 2(l).

Currently, some airline (Such as Westjet) are taking liberties with this lack of "definition" in the law and take the position that advance schedule changes are not "cancellations" and thus fall outside the scope of the APPR. Whether that is right or wrong will require further judicial rulings by either the CTA or a Superior Court in Canada.