All airlines flying in Canada – whether they are going to, from or within the country, including connecting flights – must issue a full refund for any flight cancellation or delay if passengers cannot be compensated within 48 hours of the flight disruption.
This is an amendment, made in September, to the original regulation passed by the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) in 2019, which specified this protocol only for flight disruptions within airlines’ control. Now, even if a flight disruption was not the fault of the airline, in Canada, passengers are free to change their decision and choose a refund at any time before being provided with a confirmed reservation on an alternative flight.
If a delay of three hours or more or a cancellation is outside the airline’s control, and the airline cannot provide the passenger with a confirmed reservation on the next available flight, operated by it or a partner airline, leaving within 48 hours of the departure time on the passenger's original ticket, the airline is required to offer one of three options.
At the passenger's choice, the airline must either provide a refund, make alternative free travel arrangements, or rebook the passenger on the next available flight of any airline – including competitors.
If a flight delay or cancellation is within the control of the airline and is not due to safety issues, passengers will legally be entitled to a set level of compensation based on the length of the delay, according to Forbes. A delay of three to six hours amounts to CAD400 (R5 300), while six to nine hours raises the compensation to CAD700 (R9 300), and nine or more hours is CAD1 000 (R13 300).
Small airlines (companies with fewer than two million passengers in each of the two preceding years) will have lesser amounts of CAD125 (R1 700), CAD250 (R3 300) and CAD500 (R6 600).
The full gazette can be read here.
“These regulations will close the gap in the Canadian air passenger protection regime highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic and ensure that even when cancellations and lengthy delays occur that are outside the airline’s control, passengers will be protected if the airline cannot complete their itinerary within a reasonable period of time,” says France Pégeot, CEO of the CTA.
Complaints can also be lodged against airlines with the CTA here if they do not comply with the new regulation.
Click here to see what the CTA classifies as a flight disruption.
Crew shortage ‘safety issue’
This new regulation from the CTA is presumably to close the gap created by interpretation of the term ‘safety issue’.
In June this year, Air Canada allegedly attempted to deny passengers compensation for delayed or cancelled flights due to crew shortage by labelling the issue as one of safety, according to The Canadian Press.
On June 17, a domestic flight from Yellowknife to Calgary was cancelled four hours prior to departure, and passengers were told: “Since your Air Canada flight was delayed/cancelled due to crew constraints resulting from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our operations, the compensation you are requesting does not apply because the delay/cancellation was caused by a safety-related issue.”
The article asserted that the airline had had this policy in place since at least December 29, when an internal memo circulated instructing employees to classify flight delays and cancellations due to crew constraints as safety concerns. This allowed the airline to circumvent the requirement to compensate passengers for such disrupted flights under federal regulations. Such a policy continued to remain in place, “given the continued exceptional circumstances brought on by COVID variants,” according to Air Canada.
