Yukon鈥檚 small claims court ordered Air Canada to pay a Yukon couple $10,000 following travel disruptions that caused the couple to be flown across three different Canadian airports, resulting in the cancellation of their long-awaited vacation to Cuba.
Judge Katherine McLeod ruled that the plaintiffs were treated 鈥渟hamefully鈥� and that Air Canada contravened sections of the Air Passenger Protection Regulations (APPR) and the Montreal Convention. The judgement was delivered on Dec. 9.
The plaintiffs received approximately $1,800 from Air Canada for some of their hotel and food expenses after filing legal action, the decision stated. However, Judge McLeod determined this didn't fully cover their costs, including the new flight to another destination and their lost income.
Nettassia Southwick and James Dolsen, the plaintiffs, departed Whitehorse in February 2023 and had two layovers scheduled before they would make it to Cuba. Issues arose when Air Canada denied them boarding at Toronto Pearson International Airport because of an overbooking error.
Court documents revealed an agent announced at the gate that the flight to Cuba was oversold and requested volunteers to give up their seats for $2,400 each. Volunteers would be rebooked on an American Airlines flight to Miami the same day, with an overnight stay for a flight to Cuba the next morning, the court document reads.
As a result of the incentives offered by Air Canada, the plaintiffs surrendered their seats and were promised a hotel room, transportation and food in Miami. Southwick testified she received phone updates confirming the American Airlines flight, but boarding passes never materialized, and she later learned the flight was unavailable to them.
The defendant submitted printouts of tickets to the court, demonstrating that the American Airlines tickets promised to the plaintiffs were never produced. However, the defence highlighted that a reissued ticket for an Air Canada flight to Miami was produced without the accompanying onward ticket to Cuba.
Air Canada's lawyer, Lilliane Pham-Bui, claimed the Miami ticket had markings indicating a ticket exchange. However, the defendant did not provide details on why the exchange occurred, according to the court document.
Southwick and Dolsen, still held up at Toronto Pearson, were then told by Air Canada that a flight had been arranged for them to travel to Cuba out of Montreal on an Air Transat flight, which printouts prove.
Court documents show the plaintiffs received no additional information about their Air Transat flight to Cuba but were issued boarding passes to Montreal. Bad weather delayed Air Canada's flight to Montreal, leaving 36 minutes before the Air Transat flight to Cuba was scheduled to depart.
Upon arrival in Montreal, the plaintiffs made numerous attempts to obtain timely information about their flight, but without a reference number or boarding pass, they were bounced between Air Canada and Air Transat service desks and could not access their flight to Cuba.
The defence conceded that the plaintiffs would not have been able to make the Air Transat flight given the delays and characterized the situation as a 鈥渉opeless endeavour鈥� as no efforts were made to stop the plaintiffs from boarding the flight to Montreal.
At Montr茅al-Pierre Elliott 台湾MM裸聊室 International Airport, an Air Canada service desk agent rebooked Southwick and Dolsen on an American Airlines flight to Miami for the following morning.
The plaintiffs spent $679 for overnight accommodation, which Air Canada refused to reimburse, the court document reads. Like the situation at Toronto Pearson, the plaintiffs were not given boarding passes for their American Airlines flight to Miami.
The following morning, American Airlines refused to issue the plaintiffs with boarding passes as Southwick and Dolsen were told they didn鈥檛 have tickets. Pham-Bui could not explain why this occurred but claimed Air Canada loses visibility of flights that are not booked on Air Canada, the court document reads.
The court document notes the plaintiffs then travelled from Montreal to Toronto and then to Edmonton as Air Canada cancelled their vacation. The plaintiffs then booked a last-minute vacation to Mexico while stuck in Edmonton.
The couple incurred a variety of expenses as they were shuffled from airport to airport over a period of days and were out of pocket for much of it even after submitting claims to Air Canada. They each received $2,400 in compensation for being denied boarding in Toronto.
McLeod found they were entitled to significantly more with costs including lost wages and damages associated with Air Canada's communications failures and the stress they caused justifying the compensation the court ordered.
"Air Canada has a duty to communicate. It failed completely. It is extraordinary that without this Small Claims Court action, no person-to-person communication would have taken place. Moreover, there has been no acknowledgement of the difficulties suffered or even an apology for the complete lack of care, ever communicated," the judgment reads.
Contact Jake Howarth at jake.howarth@yukon-news.com
