TORONTO - Travel Glitches Frustrate Customers; Problems Stem from "Technology Platforms"

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Title - INDEX:Business, Travel

Source: Canadian Press/Associated Press Publication date: 2000-05-06

TORONTO (CP) -- While Air Canada officials say their amalgamation with Canadian Airlines is flying smoothly, frequent flyers are complaining of some serious turbulence.

Air travellers, especially those going through Pearson International Airport in Toronto, say they have never seen more problems, especially since the airlines merged their schedules last month.

Customers have faced constant mixups. Many find themselves standing in Disneyland-length lines, only to be told they are at the wrong terminal.

Customers across Canada are arriving at airports with tickets for cancelled flights. Others have discovered that their flights are severely overbooked and they have been bumped.

Agents have told some customers they cannot find records of their flights or their bookings in the computer.

"The very worst we anticipated is really happening, and it's tough to do anything about it," said Jennifer Hillard, vice-president of the Consumers Association of Canada, whose group opposed the merger last year.

She says her organization has received floods of customer complaints since December.

At Pearson Airport, Air Canada has tried to head off some of the confusion by setting up posters that tell passengers -- according to a mind-numbing list of flight numbers -- which airline they are flying, regardless of what their tickets say.

Air Canada's chief executive officer Robert Milton told the House of Commons transport committee this week that the amalgamation of the airlines since December has gone remarkably smoothly, although he conceded that there have been problems.

Travel agencies have been hearing volumes from angry customers, said Grahame Hubbard, director for Eastern Canada at the Flight Centre.

"We would be the ones that fix most of those glitches because the airline is very unresponsive to it," Hubbard said, noting that Air Canada's phone lines are usually jammed.

Customers who phoned Air Canada in Toronto this week faced busy signals and waits of up to half an hour to speak to an agent.

Milton said the problem stems from different "technology platforms" used by Air Canada and Canadian Airlines, which means the systems are having difficulty communicating with each other and the staff are having to handle a lot of calls manually.

Customers have also complained about changes to flight times and frequency. In an attempt to reduce overcapacity, Air Canada has streamlined the number of flights the two airlines offer at many times of the day.

Flyers say some routes have been cut too far, leaving flights overbooked and forcing them to travel at inconvenient times, Hillard said.

Milton admitted Air Canada cut back capacity "too far" in some parts of Canada and is restoring it in some cases.

But he bristles at the continuing criticisms and says polling by Air Canada shows Canadians believe overwhelmingly that it is acting responsibly in the merger.

"The thing I hope ... the country keeps in mind is that we`re 120 days into this exercise, which was mammoth and involved a company that had failed." (Globe and Mail)

Copyright 2000 by Canadian Press All Rights Reserved

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