WestJet has been caught red-handed lying about flight cancelations in order to avoid paying passengers government mandated compensation. Or at least the situation is so bad that the airline is even refusing to provide Canada’s biggest broadcaster a plausible explanation for why it’s doing what it’s doing (thanks to Jack for flagging this)…
WestJet swapping planes to avoid paying compensation
In 2019, Canada introduced the Air Passenger Protection Regulations (APPR), which includes a provision for passengers to be paid cash compensation in the event that their flight is significantly delayed or canceled. The thing is, unlike in the European Union, Canada specifically excludes disruptions due to unforeseen maintenance as being eligible for compensation.
In theory I can appreciate the logic for this carve-out, but as I pointed out when these new protections were introduced, there was no way the airlines weren’t going to use this to their advantage.
That brings us to a fascinating CBC News investigation, which was released this week. On March 2, 2026, a Canadian couple were scheduled to return from their vacation in Mexico, flying from Los Cabos (SJD) to Calgary (YYC) with WestJet. Their flight was canceled at the last minute, so they only made it home 16 hours later than planned.
Upon returning home, the couple submitted a compensation claim with the airline, only to be denied, using the maintenance excuse:
Upon review of your reservation, we are unable to approve the claim for compensation as the most significant reason for the flight interruption was due to unplanned aircraft maintenance and was required for safety purposes.
There’s only one little issue with this explanation:
- The website FlightStats (which uses information provided by airlines) showed the flight as being canceled at 8:11PM the evening before, and at exactly the same time (also 8:11PM), it showed the tail number for the flight as being changed from C-FAJA to C-GUDH
- C-FAJA, the plane initially scheduled for the flight, ended up flying to Cancun (CUN) and remained in service (what happened to the maintenance issue?), while C-GUDH, the plane that was swapped in, hadn’t flown since February 28 due to maintenance, and ended up being grounded for around a week
In other words, it would appear that when WestJet decided it wanted to cancel the flight, it swapped in a broken aircraft that was in maintenance, so that it could blame the cancellation on maintenance. CBC News investigated 34 other cases where exactly the same thing happened, where a tail number was swapped to a “broken” aircraft, and then within minutes (or even the same minute), the flight was canceled.
You might think “well, maybe there’s more to the story, let’s give the airline a chance to respond.” CBC News reports that the airline refused to directly address their questions and claims (despite being Canada’s largest broadcaster), and instead, simply said that “planes are sometimes reassigned to minimize the impact of disruptions.”
Right, it’s absolutely true that planes are sometimes reassigned to minimize the impact of disruptions, but that shouldn’t mean the airline can’t pay compensation to those passengers who were initially scheduled to be on the plane.
I can’t say I’m surprised to see this happening
The airline industry is a tough business, and I understand airlines want to do everything they can to avoid paying out cash compensation. I imagine WestJet is hardly alone in acting this way.
I’ve written about my fights with American over EC261 compensation, and how the airline outright lies, direct contradicting its own flight notes. And even when I specifically provided them documentation proving their lie, they still doubled down. Quite frankly, I probably only got this resolved because I have a blog, and it shouldn’t be this way.
My point is to say that airlines outright lying about these things is way too common. When Canada introduced consumer protections but excluded maintenance, I figured that there would be a bit of a challenge with holding airlines accountable.
Canadian regulators really need to look into this, because even if it has become normalized, it’s not okay. If the law says that only unforeseen maintenance can be used as an excuse, then swapping a flight to a plane that has been grounded for days doesn’t seem to fit that bill, in my opinion.
Bottom line
Canada requires airlines to pay cash compensation for flight cancellations, assuming the flight isn’t canceled due to unforeseen maintenance issues. From the time that these regulations were introduced, I assumed airlines wouldn’t be very honest about it, and WestJet has now been pretty clearly caught engaging in some unethical behavior.
The airline has denied many compensation claims due to unforeseen maintenance, but an investigation revealed the trick the airline is using in many of these situations. Essentially, the airline swaps in a broken aircraft at the last minute when it’s preparing to cancel a flight, so it can use the maintenance excuse.
What do you make of this WestJet practice? Is there any other logical explanation you can come up with here?
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