As I prepare my legal case against Aeroplan, I have a question to anyone who recently booked SWISS First Class award space via United: is your reservation still intact?
I’m trying to draw to sufficient data points to weigh whether (and if so, why) only Aeropaln reservations were cancelled. If you booked with United Airlines and lost your reservation, please reach out to me in the comments section below.
All the Award Expert clients that were booked in SWISS First using United miles still have valid tickets.
My next step in the Aeroplan SWISS First Class saga is to send a demand letter to Aeroplan. It will state that I want my ticket honored and will argue, using law and logic, why. It is a final attempt to avoid a lawsuit and resolve the situation amicably.
I will publish that letter, with personal details redacted, on this blog.
What Goes Around, Comes Around
Do I want to go after Aeroplan? Not specifically, I just want my ticket honored. I wish Aeroplan and Air Canada would exert greater pressure on SWISS to restore these awards. And yes, I know how difficult SWISS is to work with. Even so, if Aeroplan has to pay for my SWISS First Class tickets, it is only because they have failed to work hard enough to get SWISS to honor its obligation…
UNLESS…there is a contractual clause with Aeroplan that is not present with other carriers, explicitly prohibiting first class bookings. This is why I want to know if any Untied tickets were cancelled. This could explain why only Aeroplan bookings were cancelled and IF Aeroplan or Air Canada failed to take corrective action to block all SWISS F bookings, it suggests the sort of sloppiness that consumers should not be held responsible for.
Finally, I have little pity for Aeroplan. This is the company that quibbles with me over change fees due to political events far beyond my control. It is also the company that charges telephone booking fees when its website is broken. I view both as unethical, just like unilateral cancellations and failing to uphold contracts. This does play into the situation.
CONCLUSION
Please let me know if your United reservation was cancelled. Furthermore, please let me know how United handled it.
image: SWISS
go get them
Clearly you will win the case. Classic contract breach. Aeroplan anticipatorily repudiated your ticket/contract and your damages are the current cost of the First Class Swiss tickets. The best course would be to purchase those tickets now, in order to mitigate your damages in case the cost of the tickets go up, which Aeroplan could argue that they are only liable for the damages in the immediately time period after the breech.
Also if Aeroplan has no USA bank accounts you will have a hard time collecting any money. Hopefully they have some bank accounts here at least. I think though, that Canada allows USA check clearing from banks in Canada which will be a complete hassle to collect on.
I agreed with you up until your mitigation strategy. That’s just not how cover works. It would have to be reasonable and there is no argument he would ever buy that ticket with cash. Maybe he could buy UA biz or something like that for a decent price, but definitely not the exact same ticket.
Courts will view it as a transportation from point A to B. The means of which are less important than the result. Obviously that isn’t how we see it, but that matters very little to the law.
Are you ever worried about companies banning you for suing them? I write a lot of letters (currently fighting Amazon thru their outside counsel, WN thru in house, etc.) and would hate to be permabanned (from Amazon, I refuse to fly WN) as a result.
You go on and fight the fight I agree with your stance.
Yes do we think a company can ban you no not really they legally can’t cause you did not break the rules.
And I am sure with all the liberals and conservatives depending on what side your on it would be a PR nightmare
Tonight on NBC news customer banned because he accused an airline of failing to complete a contract
Lol lmfao
I didn’t see a thread on FT in the UA forum. Maybe you can start one by posing that question?
Matthew, do you think it is related that there is no availability for Lufthansa F, even for their own members? I searched different dates and routes, the only business is available.
Airlines ban people for doing chargebacks on tickets. To defend a chargeback as a merchant you generally need a signed CC receipt, which you don’t get when purchasing something on the internet. Companies can litigate back your way for fraudulently requesting chargebacks but it’s easier for them to just not accept your business anymore. So the risk is always there that they could put you on the naughty list which is also shared with other airlines, but you’d probably have better luck buying a powerball ticket.
@ Matthew — Let it go, let it go , let it go.
Love the song, but going to have to disagree in this case. 😉
Don’t let it go. Your in the right. Keep fighting.
I just don’t understand your self righteous indignation. You knew it was a risky ploy going in, and you knew it was a glitch that the award space was available. It was a mistake, and you knew it. You are not a victim.
You will lose if it ever goes to court, because award tickets are not cash fares, they have much more latitude.
Stop with your temper tantrum, you petulant child. If not for the opportunity to blog repeatedly on the subject, any sane person would have moved on by now.
I don’t know if he will lose or not, but I assume this case would go nowhere for exactly the reasons you already specified. It I totally agree with you that our esteemed blogger knew this was a mistake, knew it was risky and might be canceled, and now is screaming about that which was obviously probable.
I booked a flight on qantas once for me and my mate. Accidentally gave him my last name. Rung up 10mins later and they wouldn’t bust. Always left a sour taste in my mouth. They have all the leverage.
Btw as a trader we invest in systems to avoid errors. How does this constantly happen?!? Have an algo that says business class flights or Swiss availability needs a second check?!?
Also, delta tried to cancel my dads flight on Virgin from Auckland and I filed a dot (as probably Lots of people did) and they reversed.
So what if he knew it was a mistake? We all knew it was a mistake. Doesn’t make it right for Swiss to unilaterally cancel tickets.
We reserved directly with Swiss Airlines online last year. I realized I had made a typo in my husband’s name so called the airline directly. The representative canceled our online reservation and rebooked on the phone. We were billed, received our confirmation numbers for the flight. 3 days prior to flight we discovered that the reservation had not been confirmed in their computer system, so we had to purchase our tickets again since customer service doesn’t communicate with billing. Fortunately we got tickets since we were flying to Greece to start a cruise. However we lost our extra legroom seats which were no longer available. It took from April to August to receive a refund for our double charged tickets. Swiss International Air is a disaster! Beware!
Guys, you’re all correct, the situation is unfortunate and irritating. We all play a game that hinges on availability and award charts. Someone, somewhere clearly made a mistake and Swiss or Aeroplan is trying to fix it – albeit poorly, and at our irritation. If they start seeing lawsuits as a result of their actions, then they’ll likely make it even harder to thread the awards needle, all in the name of letting a handful of people fly in First class – because sometimes Business class flat beds, champagne, and filet mignon just doesn’t cut it. Please don’t screw it up this game for the rest of us in the name of “what’s right”.
Have you received replies from Swiss and Air Canada or Aeroplan to your DOT complaint? I’ve gotten the generic “we’ll reply in the future.”
Aeroplan called and left a message that Swiss doesn’t allow booking first class, and changed me to an inferior routing and class.
YAWN and here I thought the Ethiopian saga was a waste of electrons
@travelermb: C’mon, this is just getting fun