Questions and Answers

My husband and toddler recently traveled on a long haul flight from Vancouver to Riyadh. The ticket was premium economy one seat purchased through Expedia.ca. Later to add the toddler in lap we called Expedia who connected us to air Canada to add my daughter’s information. It took over asb hour to do so but eventually worked out and my husband’s and daughter flew without issue on the air canada flight with a layover in Frankfurt. Two weeks later they are in Riyadh airport about to check-in to their flight back to Vancouver, again via Frankfurt, but this time the first leg is operated by Lufthansa, they are told they cannot be checked in because my daughter’s name is incorrect. Apparently her last name and middle name have been switched. According to Lufthansa this is how they received the information from Air Canada and there is nothing Lufthansa can do to fix the issue before boarding. They tell my husband he needs to contact Air Canada to issue a new ticket with the correct name. Over the next two days I spend approximately 12 hours being communicating and being put on hold with customer service reps from air canada, lufthansa, and Expedia. Air Canada blamed Lufthansa and basically said its not their problem since in their records the name is correct. Lufthansa said their hands were tied since its not their ticket and Expedia says the best they could since they are not at fault is refund us the unused portion of the flight which would be around 40% of what we paid. After more prompting and communications and Expedia checking their logs they confirmed that air Canada input the name incorrectly in its communication with lufthansa. We decided to purchase a new one way ticket out of pocket and deal with liability and compensation after my husband’s and daughter were back home in Vancouver. We paid 2200 dollars and it was only premium economy for the 2nd leg of the journey. In the 2 days ofcourse there was a lot of distress and my husband missed a day of work.
We have decided to pursue legal action against Air Canada and the other parties involved in this fiasco but were hoping for further advice or comments. It seems insane that no one is taking responsibility for what occurred and we are having to carry the financial burden of the situation.

Hi, if you’re looking for advice to help proceed in your legal action…. I don’t think anyone here is qualified for that 🙂

With that said, sorry for your frustrating experience! I really think this is a situation where it comes down to the agent. We traveled on EgyptAir late last year, and my name was put in First Name/Last Name and my girlfriend’s was Last Name/First Name. We were very worried, and go figure, security and airport staff at checkin in Cairo could not have cared less. So we were all worked up about nothing.

In your situation, I would think the airline you booked originally with would be liable, but again, your attorney would know best. Good luck

[QUOTE=”Kholood Altassan, post: 64999, member: 5752″]
We have decided to pursue legal action against Air Canada and the other parties involved in this fiasco but were hoping for further advice or comments. It seems insane that no one is taking responsibility for what occurred and we are having to carry the financial burden of the situation.[/QUOTE]

I always feel like I need to add a disclaimer (better safe than liable ;)) – this is not legal advice and don’t take it as such, but – airlines may in limited instances be on the hook for foreseeable and direct damages. And for some things they will often pay up. Damaged luggage. [I]Maybe[/I] to cover the cost of buying a new ticket if it was to buy a new ticket to get back to work (like an important meeting). But it will be nearly impossible to get incidental damages (lost wages from a missed day of work) for many reasons – often the T&Cs when you bought the ticket limited its liability, but also the cost of pursuing legal action for a small claim just isn’t worth it. Your best bet in this case is to dispute with your credit company any charges that you can for services not provided. As to the distress caused by this – I doubt you be compensated (or feel that you have). Though Air Canada just [B]may[/B] be on the hook for the distress caused by leaving a passenger on a locked plane… 🙁