Westjet delayed flight - a question about compensation? (plus my general complaining)

[cate2]

3 of us were scheduled to fly out of Orlando on December 19th at 2:00 p.m. . That morning at 4:06 a.m. we received an email saying our flights had been delayed to the 20th (2 of us were scheduled for 2:20 p.m. and one of us for 11:25 a.m.) due to a crew issue. By 4:15 a.m. my husband was on the phone. We had many concerns the biggest being that our PCR tests would be off by over an hour with that change. By 8:00 a.m. (my husband was still on hold) I went down to the check-in area and a CM helped arrange an extra night using our points (we were at Saratoga Springs) and changed our Magic express from the 19th to the 20th.
My husband reached a human at about 9:30 a.m. who offered a flight that day on another airline with a stopover at Laguardia but there was only enough room from Laguardia to Toronto for 1 or 2 of us. That really didn't seem helpful. My husband told her that we had arranged an extra night where we were and asked if we would be compensated - she said possibly, partially and referred us to go to their compensation page. She said that if we had wanted accommodation and food vouchers we should have come to the airport and they would provided them but if we kept our receipts it was possible that we would get a partial refund. Honestly at that point I wouldn't have trusted them to provide anything, 5 hours to answer a phone ... would we even find someone to help us out or would we be scrambling to find ourselves a place to stay.

I know that this is not a unique situation. Has anybody else had this experience and applied for compensation? Did you actually receive anything, even just compensation for actual money spent (park and fly/food/extra dog care day)?


I feel really frustrated because I think that what actually happened was - we didn't have a busy flight and they cancelled our flight and distributed us onto also un busy flights the next day. I think saying that there was a 'crew issue' was a way around it being 'their fault'. My husband was sitting beside somebody also was scheduled on our original flight, as was I, and there were still empty seats.

(oh a side piece - I called back on the afternoon of the 19th after I realized that we were booked on different flights - the person I spoke to was really really nice and she did move my husband and son over to my flight but also wanted to charge us an extra $50 something a person to sit in the same row ... she was still up selling! At that point I did not want to pay them anything extra.)

 

[damo]

https://www.westjet.com/en-ca/interruptions/compensation-claims

 

[igrsod]

I have heard nothing but horror stories with West jet recently. Air Canada is not much better. It's not an easy time to be flying.
I hope you get compensation. Let us know if you do.

 

[badiggio]

Once ,on vacation in aruba,WJ changed our return flight home to the next day after.I found out while checking on our flight,not by being notified by them.Once i found out,i got on the phone and told them i wasn't prepared to pay for another nights accomodation when it was them who changed the flight.They agreed to pay for the extra nights accomodation.This was a few years ago .WJ ,imo,seems to be like a shady salesman now,with their bait and switch.Offering great prices and flights,but rarely do you get what you wanted or paid for in the end.

 

[Debbie]

Our flight for NL was cancelled mere hours before we were to be on our way. I called and got a great CS rep. She gave me a couple of choices, and we chose one the same day, with a looooong layover at YYZ. SHE told me to ask for compensation as soon as I took the flight. Actually she emphasized that a few times. When I got to NL, I applied and within a month got $$$ back onto my credit card for the flight. As well, we were downgraded for our seats and we were able to get compensation into our WJ bank for that. I was delightfully surprised.

*I did not apply for hotel (didn't need) or food.

 

[cate2]

That's good to hear Debbie! I hope something similar happens with us. When I was googling trying to find out how to apply for compensation for the out of pocket portion of the expenses I seemed to come across a lot of people posting negative experiences.

 

[Debbie]

That's good to hear Debbie! I hope something similar happens with us. When I was googling trying to find out how to apply for compensation for the out of pocket portion of the expenses I seemed to come across a lot of people posting negative experiences.

I should add that this was in September of this year, and the WJ credit and $$$ back on our credit card were both done in October....right around that 30 day mark.

 

[soccerra]

One thing I will say, and this goes for any airline really (WestJet especially). The "reason" for the crew delay will be key to compensation I have found. If they can tie it to a weather related issue at any point down the line they won't give you anything, at least IME. Before the Pandemic we had a fairly tight connection (90 minutes) at YYZ, the flight out of MCO was "delayed" like 20 minutes which in my eyes isn't even a delay. When we got to Toronto because the connection was less then 60 minutes they held all the Calgary people on the plane and told us we would be rescheduled. Being NEXUS we easily could have made it and really if our baggage made it or not wouldn't have been the end of the world, we had necessities in our carry-on. Long story short they rescheduled us for almost 24 hours later, would not pay for hotel, meals, cab, etc. They tied it into a "weather" delay leaving Orlando saying it wasn't their fault, I spoke to Supervisors, managers at the airport and they wouldn't give us a $.01.

 

[Susan2771]

what About your travel insurance? Does this type of circumstance fall under trip interruption?

 

[LisaDKG]

Our WJ flight home from Honolulu to Calgary was delayed by exactly 24 hours. They cited it was a crew issue which would impact the safety of the flight - from what I've read this is a loophole that Airlines can claim as the reason that does not make them culpable for a cancelled flight. I believe that it was because our flight was extremely empty. The flight that we took 24 hours later was very empty too and that was with the original and rebooked passengers.
We lost our upgraded Premium seats (which turned out ok as the two of us each got a row to ourselves) but it has been a time getting any sort of compensation from WJ. We tried using their online form for delays more than 9 hours. The form states that passengers have the right to up to $1000 per person to cover hotel and food but our claims were denied outright. Customer Service told us that this was because our tickets were booked with points so we had to go through an insurance claim through our bank who provided the points.
While it was no hardship to stay an extra 24 hours in Honolulu! it certainly wasn't cheap as our hotel with taxes was over $500. It would have been very different if we were not able to stay in our same hotel or extend our car rental.
Now with all of the cancellations over Christmas and other reports of poor customer service from Westjet in the news, I am not as eager to book with them. I used to really respect them as a corporation and chose to fly them whenever possible - I loathed Air Canada due to many issues with trips over the years. Now I guess I have to spread the loathing around.

 

[cate2]

I hope you get compensation Lisa!

I have an update on our compensation. I didn't actually submit any receipts for food or accommodation (we used DVC points so didn't really know how to submit that) but we have been offered compensation for the delay as it was 'within our control'. Here's were it gets weird, I was given $1000 for the 21 hr delay and my son and husband were each offered $400.
I think, or at least I'm hoping that it's probably an honest mistake. As I mentioned in my original post, when the re-scheduled our flight(s) they originally had us flying out at 2 separate times and I had called to try and get the same flight. The agent was great and did get us 3 spots on the earlier of the two flights.

All that being said, I'm happy and surprised that Westjet actually followed through! I thought for sure they'd claim it was a safety issue due to lack of staff.

 

[MamaLema]

I have WJ credits expiring in April and I am not looking forward to using them. I don’t trust that my flight will actually depart on time or even the same day

 

[badiggio]

wj announced they will consolidate upcoming flights;I'd hold off booking anything with them unless given a great deal and willing to accept the more than likely changes to your flight and or schedule.

 

[bookbabe626]

I have WJ credits expiring in April and I am not looking forward to using them. I don’t trust that my flight will actually depart on time or even the same day

Usually you can pay a very small fee, think it was about $25 maybe? to have the expiry date extended on your travel bank credits. Might be worth calling to ask.

 

[chezcurrie]

Wanted to report back that we had a similar experience to the OP and did receive compensation for our cancelled flight from LAX to YYZ on Dec 19. Similar to OP WJ cancelled our flight at 4am on the day of, and put us on a connecting flight the next evening (so over 24 hrs). We also extended our hotel stay and called and were finally put in a direct flight the next day. I applied for compensation through WestJet and about a month later (not reimbursement for expenses) and we did receive an email saying we would be refunded $400 pp. So it is definitely worth it to file for compensation.