There’s an airline Catch 22 at work in Canada that essentially prevents airlines from taking complaint unless you go to the media. Then you might get the attention of Air Canada, for example. But if you’ve been short-changed or made to feel like a nobody on board an AC flight, chances are you are never going to be able to say it to them privately. The government requires many industries to permit access to a complaint process. But airlines can still hide behind the Internet, and Air Canada does. You will fill out forms and guess at endless “capchas” before they even acknowledge you are a person. How about complaining on the spot. Better not. Flight attendants do not want to hear what you think. Just what you want for dinner. And if it looks like you are even slightly unhappy the captain is in touch with the ground. So it is that some passengers who lost luggage in the recent mob scenes at Pearson and elsewhere are saying Canada should be required to publicly disclose complaints about baggage, cancelled flights and tarmac delays, just like their counterparts do in the U.S.
