sbmarti2

Hey everyone,

I'm researching a flight from Halifax to London, and they have a few different classes. They have tourist and leisure classes, which are around 180-230, then latitute plus which is 919, and executive which is 1900 something.

Clearly the last one is first class. However, the only differences between the tourist and leisure and lattitute plus ones are that lattitute plus allows you to chance flights for free and gives 250 more aeroplan miles, leisure allows you to switch flights for a fee and are non-refundable, and the tourist ones are non refundable.

For such a decrease in price for an identical seat, I'm a little suspicious. Can anyone clear this up for me?

WillTravel

The Air Canada forum at FlyerTalk.com can explain this in more and better detail, but there is a legitimate but ridiculous price discrepancy. I suspect that Air Canada is trying to compete with several charter/lower-cost carriers that fly Halifax to London with their lowest fare class.

OReilly

Executive is the AC Business First (basically just BC as AC does not have First Class).

ALL the rest are regular economy, just with different restrictions/points etc. which are explained on the AC website. Latitude Plus is a Y Class ticket - complete freedom essentially and targeted at the busienss traveller. Your choice depends on YOUR flexibility: If you have complete flexibility and are absolutely sure of your dates, choose the lowest fare. Only caveat is if you are using upgrades, which only work with certain fares (usually Y, M, B, V).

Also, are you SURE these fares are return? They look like one-way fares to me. Do check again, just in case. Restricted BC fare to London from YYZ is usually over $5000.

Regards Ger

AnselmAdorne

sbmarti, I think Ger has zeroed in on the issue; those sure look like one way fares. I just priced Halifax to London for dates in February and got $194 each way for Leisure class. Add in $150 for fuel taxes and a whole bunch of other taxes and fees, and you're up to Cdn $687 for a round trip. (You can reduce that to $647 if you're prepared to forego seat selection.)

If you're riding in the back of the bus, the seats and service on international flights are all the same, whether you book Tourist, Leisure, or Latitude Plus. There are several things that make the AC flight attractive for us Haligonians: it's a daily flight, the arrival and departure times are very civilized, and it's now non-stop. Air Canada is also upgrading its fleet: new seats, individual seatback screens, and video on demand; the bad news is that the makeover is occurring in slow motion, so you'll still likely get a tired cabin in the near future.

As Will Travel mentioned, there's a wealth of information on FlyerTalk. If you find the Aeroplan/Air Canada section, there is a sticky explaining AC's booking classes. It's a bit cryptic, but it might help.

Anselm

Gavin

It's really pretty simple. Just pick the lowest fare unless you want the big comfy seats at the front. All the seats arrive at the same time and all the "Hospitality" class seats are pretty much the same no matter what you pay. The AC site explains it all very clearly.