Suck it, Air Canada

Remember the times when air travel was deemed fancy? You wore your best suit with your matching luggage trailing behind you and you sipped champagne at the gate without ever wrecking your lipstick. 

I don't remember either. But I know there was a time. 

Now air travel has been reduced to cramped seating, a tiny plastic cup of apple juice and a complimentary bag of approximately 2.7 sesame snacks per person. And for $17 you can get a dry turkey sandwich. 

When you add, on top of that, the crappiest customer service of all time, it's not always a very enjoyable experience. 

Last summer I had to travel to Toronto a lot for work. On one return trip, my co-worker and I were bumped from the flight. As in, we were told we could not get on the flight we had paid for and were scheduled to take. 

Air Canada offered us a $200 credit to take the later flight. Actually, it wasn't so much an offer. We had no choice. There was simply no room for us on the plane. I offered to sit on the captain's lap but Air Canada employees don't have much of a sense of humour. 

Tell me, please. How does overselling a flight benefit anyone? You get disgruntled travellers who do nothing but bitch about the airline for pretty much ever. And one of those travellers is very active on Twitter. Ahem. Just sayin'. 

When I went to Panama in April, our charter left from Toronto. So I had to book a one-way ticket to Toronto to meet my sister there. Oh. What a perfect occasion to use my $200 Air Canada credit you say? Yes. I agree. So I booked my flight and sent in all the required information to get reimbursed. 

When I got to the gate for my 9am flight from Montreal to Toronto, the Air Canada people were asking passengers to volunteer to take a later flight at noon. Their reward for such a nobel act? A $200 credit, of course. In my head I scoffed at the poor suckers who weren't going to make it. But I wasn't worried. I had to get to Toronto so I could catch my charter to Panama City at 1pm. Taking the noon flight just wasn't an option. I'd miss my flight and my $1200 vacation would go down the tubes. Fuck that noise. Surely Air Canada was going to come through for me. I mean, I paid for THIS flight with one of their damn bump-you-from-your-flight-because-we-suck credits. 

Oh, how naive I was. 

A group of three girls next to me at the gate had to catch a flight to Paris from Toronto and there is only one flight a day. Well, all four of  us were bumped. They were going to miss their Toronto-Paris flight and I was going to miss my vacation. Yet again, I was told there was no room for me on the flight I paid for and was scheduled to take. 

I marched over to the Air Canada customer service desk and not-so-calmly explained my situation. The girl behind the counter told me there was nothing she could do. The noon flight was the only one they had any room on. That's when the tears started. And the hyperventilating. 

"IhavetogettoTorontoIMMEDIATELYbecauseIhaveaflighttoPanamatocatchand...(sob)...anditsmyvacationandAirCanadaisCRAPand...(sob)...andthisismyvacationandIpaidtwelvehundreddollarsandI'mjustnotmissingthisand...(sob)..." 

Someone with more power than the woman in front of me finally intervened probably because my voice had gone up about 12 octaves and it was starting to look like someone from Air Canada customer service was beating me. She clickety clicked on her keyboard and offered me a Business Class seat on a flight that was leaving in half an hour. 

WHAT!? THERE WAS ANOTHER FLIGHT THIS WHOLE TIME!? 

Hate.

She also gave me my effing $200 credit to which I responded, "how do I even use this? Because I am supposed to get reimbursed for THIS flight because I had another credit and I haven't heard anything back." 

Her answer? 

"Actually, I'm not sure. Some people claim you can just type in a number when booking online, others say that doesn't work. You'll have to look online to figure it out." 

WHAT!? 

An Air Canada employee, responsible for giving out these damn credits DOESN'T EVEN KNOW HOW TO USE THEM. 

More hate. 

Fast forward to August. I'm still trying to get my money back for that April flight. After a half hour on the phone, Air Canada told me to email them my flight itinerary. So I did. The email address doesn't work. My email bounced back three times. Then Air Canada told me to fax them. So I did. I got a fax back saying it takes at least 15 working days to hear back from them. It's been 15 working days. 

My manfriend lives in Ontario so I figured I'd use my remaining credit to visit him. According to my extensive research, the only real way to use the credit is to drive to the airport, and buy a ticket there. So I offered manicures and unlimited hugs to my friend Anne-Marie if she would take me. 

She agreed. 

When I was next in line, two of the three employees decided it was a good time to go in the back and eat a sandwich. There were about 12 people behind me. When sandwich guy finally returned 10 minutes later, his recent meal still left on his face, he searched through his computer from 1982 to find me the best deal to Toronto. The whole process took about 45 minutes. 

And then? And then the printing. On a printer older than my dad. You know what I'm talking about. The ones that have the paper with the holes on the side. That make a terrible WEE-WAH, WEE-WAH sound, 

The result? I finally saved $200 on a flight and I can't wait to pull this sucker out of my purse when I check in. Also, I need a haircut.