Giving Air Canada a second chance

In all fairness to Air Canada, I felt that I should post the messages I've received from/sent to Air Canada since my initial "why Air Canada sucks!" post.

I received the first reply to my follow-up post about 15 days after I sent it. And this time, it was from an actual person and not a standard/cookie-cutter response:

Response (D--) - 01/29/2009 09:40 AM
Dear Ms. --:

Thank you for your follow up email.

I am sorry it has taken so long to respond. I needed to contact Vancouver for an explanation and it took a little longer than I expected.

An aircraft swap was needed and the aircraft that replaced the original one had less seating capacity. That is why a few people were bumped from the flight.

As a gesture of goodwill, we are pleased to provide you with a future travel credit in the amount of $100.00 CAD. This transferable credit may be used toward the purchase of an Air Canada ticket for future travel on Air Canada and/or Air Canada Jazz and is valid until January 29, 2010, one year from today. This means that it must be applied to a new ticket purchased within that time frame, however, travel does not have to commence within the year. Your credit number is: -----.

If booking through our Call Centre, simply provide the number shown above to the agent at the time of booking.

If booking on our web site or through a travel agent, please wait until travel has been completed, however, no longer than 90 days, and then email the new ticket number along with the travel credit number shown above, to refundservices@aircanada.ca. They will refund the value of the credit back to the credit card used to purchase the new ticket. If you wish to transfer the credit to another person, please include a note in your correspondence authorizing the transfer.

You may also fax or mail the electronic travel credit number and new ticket number to our Refunds Department.

Fax: (204) 941-2789.

Air Canada Refund Services
P.O. Box 6475
Winnipeg, MB R3C 3V2

We apologize for this inconvenience to your travel plans. Thank you for allowing us this opportunity to review your concerns.

Sincerely,

D--
Customer Relations

I still wasn't particularly satisfied with that, so I sent yet another follow up response:

Customer - 01/30/2009 03:07 AM
Thank you for your response. I feel a little bit better at least knowing what happened. However, this does raise other questions for me, such as why was the airplane switch necessary? And why weren't passengers informed about this decision at the time?

Moreover, how is it decided as to which passengers get bumped off the flight in such circumstances? And what is airline policy regarding compensation in such situations (disregarding the complications arising from the weather)?

And most importantly, what is being done to improve the customer service provided in such times of difficulty? (Even with the recent explanation, I still think it's completely unacceptable that no one bothered to explain what was going on to us at the time.)

I mean, I understand a little better what happened now, but I think a flight credit as a "goodwill gesture" is pretty pathetic considering that the experience of being put into standby hell in Vancouver was traumatizing enough for me to question whether I would ever fly Air Canada again, since apparently it's an airline that simply bumps people off flights without any apologies, explanations or meaningful compensation. (It doesn't really count when *I* have to keep emailing after the fact for a satisfactory explanation.)

Honestly, up to now I've liked Air Canada. I thought that Tokyo-Toronto flights were both convenient and reasonably priced. But after all this, I'm seriously considering not using Air Canada simply on principle. I'd rather fly with an airline that takes better care of and shows more respect to its customers, even if it means spending more money or dealing with the inconvenience of stopping in the US.

Customer service's response was very fast this time:

Response (D--) - 01/30/2009 11:47 AM
Dear Ms. --:

I certainly do understand your present feelings. I would probably feel the same way you do. Normally, when an aircraft swap is required, we are able to get our passengers to their destinations within the same day. I know it was a very trying time and emotions were high with it being Christmas and everyone wanting to be home with family.

When we need to choose who to bump off a flight, we usually choose passengers who are only going to that destination and do not have a connection onward.

I would like you to know that Air Canada has learnt from these events and is reviewing their methods and procedures in irregular operations in order to help our agents help our passengers. Customer Relations has a good idea of what needs to be done and we will be included in these revised procedures. I am extremely hopeful that our future irregular operations will be less chaotic and more productive.

I am not attempting to minimize the situation but this was a very unusual holiday season for our airline also. With so many flights being cancelled and delayed our employees probably did not know what to do half the time. The flights were already full and reprotecting passengers became almost impossible. Often, if an agent found a new routing to get someone home, then that flight was later cancelled or delayed also. Everyone was really overwhelmed.

When we experience one major storm within our network, it can take a couple of days to recuperate from the flight cancellation and delays. Rescheduling our crews and aircraft to their new destinations takes a lot of planning when they are stuck in a different city than planned. This winter's storms just came at us one after another after another.

Our goodwill offer of 25% was to show our passengers that we do care. The additional $100.00 voucher was also to let you know that we do value your support. I am only asking you to realize that these were some unusual circumstances and to give us another chance to provide you with the quality service you have experience with us in the past.

We are hoping to welcome you on board a future flight to Tokyo.

Sincerely,

D--
Customer Relations

Well, that response made me feel like I was being a bit too churlish, but I still wasn't completely ready to drop the issue, and I still had one more pressing question:

Customer - 01/31/2009 09:46 AM
Thank you for your fast response. I'm sorry to be so doggedly persistent on the issue, but I feel it's reasonable for me to want to know WHY was there an aircraft swap "needed"?

The latest response:

Response (D--) - 02/04/2009 04:25 PM
Dear Ms. --:

I have been trying to see if I could have more information on this issue. Unfortunately, I have not been getting anywhere. I will take an educated guess from what I can see, however, do not hold me to it.

It looks like they swapped the planes in order to operate an aircraft with more capacity on a flight to Hong Kong. I believe this was to accommodate all the delayed passengers in the last couple of days due to the bad weather. Air Canada will always give a priority to an international flight.

It is easier to protect passengers traveling on a domestic flight than on an international flight especially when the flight is going to Asia.

If I hear anymore on this issue I definitely will email you with this information.

Sincerely,

D--
Customer Relations

Well, as a passenger coming into Vancouver on an international flight myself, I could accept and understand that they would prioritize getting the international flight backlogs cleared before the domestic ones. I still think the way Air Canada handled their customer relations during the whole "crisis" was completely sucky, but I'm no longer angry at what happened (just at how it was handled). I'm still going to try to fly with other Star Alliance member airlines (so I can still collect Aeroplan miles), but if Air Canada's the most logical option (as it is for the Tokyo-Toronto flight), I'm going to give them another chance.

My final email:

Even if you ultimately can't find out the specifics, I appreciate the educated guess. Thank you very much.

So this August I'll be using the 25% discount and $100 travel credit to come back for WAY camp. If Air Canada screws up again, I'm not going to be so forgiving, but for now, I'm willing to give them a second chance.

Money matters...

I recently purchased and read "The Money Book: A Survival Guide for Canadians under 35" by Kevin Cork (a.k.a. "The Screaming Capitalist").

It was a pretty easy and informative read, even though it didn't really give me as much detail as I was looking for about different savings/investment options--GICs, CSBs, mutual funds, etc.

Anyway, the point it hammered home to me is that I really should've started investing my money the year after I started earning an annual income--i.e. when I was 18 years old!! And that even though I can't regain the 7 years I've wasted, I shouldn't delay but should start saving now!

"Anyone who is currently less than 35 and does not have a million saved at retirement won't have "nice" life; they'll have a "fridge-box under the bridge" life filled with dogfood." - Kevin Cork

So currently I'm looking into RRSPs (I didn't realize you could carry forward your tax deductions for RRSP contributions!!) and am trying to figure out how to best utilize the tax-free savings account I already opened with Scotia. Currently it's just a cash account, but I think it would make more sense to purchase some GICs or mutual funds for it as well...

Honestly, I would really like to find a financial advisor to help me with all this, but I guess I'll just have to muddle my through until I move back to Canada permanently.

It's pretty ridiculous when I survey my accounts and realize that I've got probably less than a third of the money that I've sent home is actually still in accounts at home--the rest has gone to paying off credit card bills, buying manga, etc. etc. Even if it's only $25/month into an RRSP, I need to start doing something to save for my future (and not just for my next trip)!

The recent car accident also made me realize that I really ought to build up an "emergency fund" here in Japan. Even if it means sending a little less home each month (painful considering how well the exchange rate is working in my favour currently), I've realized that money in the bank in Canada doesn't do me much good when I'm facing the possibility of paying a 100,000yen insurance deductible for car repairs and payday is still 3 weeks away! Sure I can get money sent back to Japan from home, but in a real emergency, I might not have the time to get the transfer set up and everything.

Haste makes waste

Subtitle: I'm a such an idiot!!

I was a little worried about making it to school on time today, so I took the turn just before the bridge on the (country) road leading to my school a little too fast. I hit a patch of ice, tried and failed to control a slide, spun around, hit the railing of the bridge, and possibly spun around again before stopping back on the proper side of the road.

In short, I had a car accident.

Thankfully there weren't any cars too close by at the time, and I had my seat belt on and the airbag didn't deploy so physically I was fine. Mentally I've been kicking myself all morning/afternoon for being such a careless idiot, but overall I'm just really thankful that the only real damage was to my car.

As Tomabechi-sensei and everyone else pointed out, it could've been worse: the river would've been very cold today!

Anyway, the first thing I did was call Kirita to tell them about the accident. They called Mukainakano-sensei for me. The mother of one of my ninensei students happened to be passing by right around the time of the accident, so she helped me place the call to JAF. When Tomabechi-sensei and Takasugi-sensei (the art/P.E./sannensei teacher) arrived, Tomabechi-sensei took over the call to JAF. The two of them stayed with me until Mukainakano-sensei came.

When Mukainakano-sensei came, she called my insurance company for me. Nagasue-sensei (a co-worker at the office) also came and advised us to call the police. The JAF truck came but we had to wait for the police to come and look at the scene before moving the car.

The police came and took measurements and asked questions about what had happened--how fast was I going, about where did I start sliding/spinning, etc. etc. Once they were done, Mukainakano-sensei drove me to the dealership where I got my car (with the JAF truck following behind) and there we learned that we wouldn't be able to get a repair estimate until the following day.

On the advice of Nagasue-sensei, Mukainakano-sensei took me to the Higashi Hospital to get my head/neck checked out. Even though I felt totally fine, he said it was better for me to go to the hospital in case I turned out to have whiplash or something later; if I didn't go first, I might have trouble filing for any medical insurance claims related to the accident later on.

After the hospital, Mukainakano-sensei treated me to lunch before taking me home.

At home, I called my parents and emailed people to tell them what had happened.

So that was my first major driving accident (I don't count backing into parked cars or even getting rear-ended last year).

All in all, I have to just keep reminding myself that it could've been a lot worse. The lessons I've learned from the experience?

1) sleep early, wake up early, and leave early so you can take your time and drive carefully
2) getting the JAF (Japanese equivalent of CAA/AAA) membership was totally worthwhile
3) deciding to get car insurance that covered damage to my own car (instead of just for other people's cars, injuries, property damage, etc.) was absolutely the right choice
4) it's important to stay positive; I feel like a the biggest idiot in the world right now, but at least I've only suffered mental/emotional damage, rather than physical injury!

Oh, and as luck would have it, I had my camera with me because the ninensei had a cooking class scheduled, so I've got pictures of the damage!















(Picture 1: Where I hit the bridge. Picture 2: Car damage.)

Check out the rest (along with my comments) in my Facebook album!

Re: A job or a calling?

I was going to post a comment in response to the last two questions a friend wrote in a blog post ("A Job or a Calling?"), but then realized I had way too much to say to confine it to a comment post.

Her questions were: "Are you willing to go the extra mile in your job?" and "Can you picture a future in it? "

Probably I've talked about this before in this blog, but the sad thing I've come to realize is that, as I am now, because my answer to the former is "yes," my answer to the latter has to be "no."

And that, more than anything tells me how immature I still am.

I throw myself into things wholeheartedly and end up getting burned out because I still haven't learned how to balance all the various aspects of my life: work, relationships with friends/family, down time, etc. And I'm still selfishly lazy enough that I don't want to spend years of my life overworking so that I can learn how to make that balance.

Even though I'm passionate about education, right now I feel like it's more important for me to have a job that I can enjoy but that won't consume my life outside of my working hours. And teaching--assuming you're a teacher who cares, of course--is NOT that kind of a job.

One of the reasons (maybe not the biggest one, but a reason nonetheless) I haven't signed my re-contracting papers yet even though I'm 90% sure that I'd like to stay for a third (and likely final) year, is because I've been feeling so worn out and tired of working all the time recently. I think I can last a third year, but I'm a little worried that partway through I'm just going to burn out and stop caring about the job. And I've been so frustrated this year feeling like far too many ALTs only do what's asked of them--without even thinking of doing more--that I wouldn't be able to forgive myself if I turned into one of them.

I guess what I lack is perseverance and faith in myself. People keep telling me that if I just give teaching a couple of years, I'll get better at it and start being more of the teacher I want to be, but I honestly don't think I'm capable of a) learning that fast; and b) sticking it out that long.

And because all that ed psych talk about the lasting effects of bad teaching really stuck with me, I'm not willing to subject students to my bad teaching if at the end I'm just going to give up (on a teaching career) anyway. I know, it's a completely pessimistic, defeatist attitude, but there you have it. Guess I'm just not a "yes, we can" kind of person.

When faced with the choice of regretting something I did NOT do or regretting something I did, I'm pretty sure I'd choose the former every time.

You might ask, "where is God in all this?" And, to be frank, I'm asking the same thing.

Going home and back to MCBC for Christmas really showed me just how ungrounded I've become. In "Christian-ese" we always talk about going through the valleys to reach the hilltops, but I'm feeling like I'm wandering around on a plateau in a huge crater or something--not necessarily going down, but definitely not going up anywhere either. It seems like in my time in Japan I've become more aware of my flaws, but less inclined to act to fix them.

Well, maybe that's just my current state of mind casting a feeling of languor over everything. (Actually, I really hope that's the case!)

But enough of the depressingly honest talk! I finally uploaded some photos to Facebook, so enjoy!

- Office Year End Party, Part 1
- Office Year End Party, Part 2
- Soroptomist New Year's Potluck