Canada’s largest airline says it made a mistake when a man was initially denied a refund for a plane ticket after his wife died suddenly from cancer.
Gary Zubatiuk and his wife Caroline had purchased a $1,300 ticket from Air Canada for a July visit to Vancouver to visit her family. But just weeks later, Caroline, who appeared to be in good health, was diagnosed with cancer and given just days to live.
She passed away two weeks later.
Before Caroline died, Zubatiuk asked Air Canada if the tickets could be given to her sons in Vancouver, so they could fly out to see their mother before she died.
Zubatiuk said he was informed that the tickets were not transferable.
“I said, ‘What happens to her ticket if she passes on,’ and they said, ‘Sorry for your luck.’”
Zubatiuk said he contacted CTV News because he felt it was wrong for the airline to keep the ticket money when his wife had died.
“At least if they refund some of the money it’d be fine, because right now, I’ve lost my income, my wife, my best friend,” said an emotional Zubatiuk.
When contacted by CTV, Air Canada said mistakes were made in handling Zubatiuk’s situation.
“This is a very unfortunate situation, but as soon as our customer relations department became aware of this issue we immediately refunded the customer’s full fare in accordance with our normal practice in cases involving a death,” airline spokesperson Peter Fitzpatrick told CTV.
Company policy states that when a ticket holder dies, a death certificate must be provided in order to obtain a refund. But in this case, Air Canada didn’t ask for one.
It’s also standard practice at Air Canada to not allow name changes on tickets to prevent ticket re-selling.
Zubatiuk said he hopes what happened to him will lead to better staff training.
“Right at the beginning, whoever answers the phones maybe should be more educated on how to handle it,” he said.
