Face of Nation : A group of friends from Winnipeg who spent the weekend at a bachelorette celebration in Kelowna, B.C., say a cancelled flight left them stranded — with the airline offering return flights more than a week later.
Six women, including Anika Scheurer, booked their flights from Winnipeg with Swoop, an ultra-low-fare airline owned by WestJet. “It was mainly price and the dates,” Scheurer, 24, said in explaining why she chose Swoop. She said the round-trip ticket was about half the price offered by other airlines.
But as the group prepared to board a plane home Monday, a mechanical problem caused a delay. Hours later, the delay turned into a cancellation. That’s when the airline “turned a celebratory weekend into a nightmare,” said Scheurer.
According to Gabor Lukacs, founder of the non-profit organization Air Passenger Rights, that’s why travellers need to know what they’re entitled to when trip plans go sideways. “This is an egregious case. Offering someone transportation the next week is unreasonable and unjustifiable,” said Lukacs.
Scheurer said the airline gave her and the other passengers a hotel voucher for the night and said $30 would be reimbursed for meals. They were told Swoop would find them flights or charter a plane within 48 hours. But when she received an email from the airline late Monday night, she learned the flight home was scheduled a week later, Sept. 2. She said the group of six women was split up on various flights, with some scheduled to leave even later.
“We had someone who was doing pet boarding, there was child-care cost, wages lost,” said Scheurer, adding that some of the women would be drawing from next year’s vacation time.
Scheurer called the number provided and discovered Swoop’s call centre is only open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. MT on weekdays. The group got in touch with WestJet and paid for flights home with that airline on Tuesday.
