TORONTO — Kim Babcock thought she had found a pretty good deal with Air Canada last month: two round-trip tickets to St. John’s, N.L. for $998.76, and a third to Fort Lauderdale, Florida for $485. But when she got her credit card receipt, she realized she had a problem.
The airline had correctly charged her in Canadian funds for the flight to Florida; but they billed her in U.S. dollars for the trip to Newfoundland, at a cost of almost $400 more.
“I’m flying in Canada, through a Canadian website, there’s no reason to think I’m going to be charged in another currency, it wouldn’t even be a question,” Babcock said Thursday.
READ MORE: Air Canada customer says she was wrongly billed for flight in U.S. dollars
When she called Air Canada to complain, she says multiple representatives insisted she must have logged in to the U.S. Air Canada site, which she says she had not.
They refused to credit her back the difference between the Canadian and U.S. dollar amounts, even when she produced her receipt from the online transaction.
“It said $998.76 Canadian dollars in bold, I thought that was pretty clear,” Babcock said.
The receipt couldn’t be more explicit, but she says on three occasions, agents insisted the mistake was her fault.
“They were not helpful, they were rude,” she said, describing what she called a series of frustrating experiences.
Denied a refund, Babcock called Global News Consumer SOS for help.
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Within two hours, the airline’s tone was different.
“We have contacted the customer to apologize and rectify the situation,” said Peter Fitzpatrick, spokesman for Air Canada.
“To ensure she pays no more than the quoted price in Canadian dollars. At this point, we are investigating to determine how this occurred.”
Back in June, Maureen Gordon of Toronto reported a similar issue with AirCanada.com.
She says she was charged in U.S. dollars for a flight to Greece, having also booked her flight on the airline’s website in Canada.
In that case, the airline did not admit it made any mistake.
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