Thoughts on Air Transat post-pandemic?

[peacefrogdog]

Looking at flights for a post-Christmas cruise out of Port Canaveral. So far prices are not looking great for Air Canada and Westjet. Air transat has, by far, the cheapest flights ($280 pp vs $420 pp to fly out Dec 26). However while I'm more confident Air Canada and Westjet will stay afloat financially, I'm not sure I can say the same about Air Transat.

Has anyone had dealings with them getting refunds etc. since the pandemic began, to get a sense of how sound they seem to be financially?

 

[bababear_50]

Just an article about Air Transat
a few days ago


Transat AT reaches $700-million aid deal with federal government


https://www.cp24.com/news/transat-at-reaches-700-million-aid-deal-with-federal-government-1.5406962
Best wishes finding a great , reasonable flight.
Hugs
Mel

 

[ottawamom]

For the price difference I think I would just book AC or Westjet.

 

[Minniemoo15]

We have almost always flown air transat to MCO but this year I was too nervous to book with them. I booked Air Canada as I know it’s not going anywhere.

 

[tgropp]

We had a flight with Air Transat for last December and of course we cancelled. We got a full credit and are using it this November. They changed the refund over to US dollars. Not sure why though

 

[Marek Zyskowski]

I don't think there will be an issue with Air Transat. Their base business is the Quebec and Ontario market and the Premiere in Quebec is the ex CEO. If anything they will be in a strong position once vacation travel normalizes.
When travel demand returns and it will bigtime. I think all the sun destinations will return to their flight schedule.

 

[Pumpkin1172]

I have not flown with Air Transat during covid, but I have used them pre-covid.

Personally, I would pay the extra money and go with Air Canada or West Jet. Our family will NOT be going with Air Transat again. We had used them for a group trip ( wedding ) and had soooooooo much trouble with them.

They charter many of the planes that they use. Out of one departure city, we had an OLD OLD plane, that should only be used for short haul flights (our flight was 6+ hours) in small squishy seats. It had NO technology....meaning it had the overhead bunks with a tv in the bulkhead placed sporatically throughout the plane and your earphones/head phones plugged into the arm rest. They had three movies playing through the trip...2 of which were scratched and didn't play.

We all had trouble logging into their system at the 24 hr mark to pick out seats, and mostly by the time we did, families were split up...even kids NOT sitting with their parents but random strangers. The 1-800 number to contact them was ZERO help, and their website crashed. The travel agent was " conveniently" away that weekend, and no other agent in that office would help.

They were more than happy to sell us extra excursions at the resort, but when transportation didn't show up, getting our money returned for an excursion we didn't even get to do was like pulling teeth. It took me months to get my money back from them for that one.

We had paid for an upgraded room...and didn't get our upgraded room. And there was also problems with the room for our boys on the first night.

When I"m spending 8000+ on a vacation, I expect to not run into sooo many problems. I understand things happen, but we had many thing happen that left s VERY sour taste in the whole group 50+ people who won't even travel with Air Transat again. Many of them are frequent travellers and won't travel with that company again.

 

[azrivest]

Unfortunate you had that one very bad experience.

Have you never been rouge'd? They have the worst seat pitch I have ever seen in my life. I avoid AC rouge planes like the plague, except for MCO which is about the only direct option from YUL. Thank goodness it's only a 2h30 flight.

My experiences with Transat have always been much more pleasant than with AC, especially with young children.

I'll use Transat again no doubt over AC for our next trip to Punta Cana. I guess we can have bad and good experiences with all Canadian companies. Except maybe WestJet. WestJet is always good

 

[Jrb1979]

I haven't used any Canadian Air lines in a long time. I find they are too expensive. Since I live in Niagara I usually fly out of Buffalo. It's cheaper and I've already have gone through customs. 2 years ago my wife and I flew to Orlando and it cost us $300 US return.

 

[White Cat]

We kept getting flights cancelled so gave up on them. I’m sure we have a credit. Have a credit with Allegiant too for cancelled flights out of Niagara Falls. Air Canada and American has been reliable.

 

[peacefrogdog]

I haven't used any Canadian Air lines in a long time. I find they are too expensive. Since I live in Niagara I usually fly out of Buffalo. It's cheaper and I've already have gone through customs. 2 years ago my wife and I flew to Orlando and it cost us $300 US return.

We used to do that up until 6 years ago, and then decided to fly out of Pearson for convenience not to mention we were always nervous about winter weather preventing us from making it to Buffalo (from Toronto) in time. Love the Buffalo airport - easy to navigate, everyone is pleasant.

Back then Southwest, Jetblue, Air trans (are they still in business?) were offering crazy cheap flights to/from BUF to MCO in the $50 USD one way range. When I had last checked however they seemed to have gone up in comparison to the $120-150 USD range. Is that just a post-COVID thing or has it been like that for a while?