Virgin Atlantic tried the YVR route and bailed. Which probably tells you all you need to know about how many carriers it can support.

Hmm, I booked LGW>YVR>YEG about a month ago for this summer. Thank you WestJet. Looking forward to seeing the revised itinerary :cool:

Don’t be surprised if they offer LGW-YYC-YVR-YEG

Why would they do that?

My experience has been the automated rebooking algorithms on some airlines are not that bright. If it tries to find a replacement for the cancelled flight then it would do that. If it tries to find a replacement for the entire journey then it would do something more reasonable.

So since the original flight touched YVR, the algorithm will want to keep YVR in the equation? Goodness, I hope a human with common sense will see that and adjust the alternative appropriately!

I'm always interested in these type of comments. Have you flown multiple times with Swoop and Flair to compare the two? I haven't myself and the only thing I have to go on is traveler reviews and even those are skewed since most people that have a good experience won't leave a review but those that have a bad review will.

Based on what I have read there is no difference between Swoop and Flair. When the flights went bad, they went bad in the same way including last minute flight time changes, last minute flight cancellations, no customer service agent to talk to let alone get a hold of, lost baggage and flight delays. I think there is this bias towards Swoop when things go well and people say "oh well that's because they're part of WestJet which they are not" but when things go bad people will say "oh well that's because they're not part of WestJet so you can't blame WestJet for that". Your chances of getting stuck is no different on a Swoop or Flair flight.

You also mention that WestJet has a good reputation. I believe their reputation is no different than AC or any other airline and I have been saying for years on the YEG thread that WS is no different than AC and is becoming AC. In fact they are AC on a smaller scale with a hub at YYC as opposed to YVR, YYZ and YUL. Their "attitude" and "niceness" are no better or worse than AC. I believe WS has to work harder now to get passengers since they are a private firm, unionized and they can't announce that your everyday neighbors Joe and Frank will be flying the plane. My personal opinion is also that WestJet is simply trying to run a competitor out of business by creating a new airline to compete. AC will either lower their fares on their existing flights or let the ULCC's pick up the scraps. WS won't compete directly. I guess ultimately I don't feel that WS is the "nice guy" they have always pretended to be.

Oh how ever will they cope with only 4 daily LHR/LGW flights for a metro of 2.5 million. I'm in that metro of 1.5 million that since March 2020 has enjoyed 0 weekly let alone daily flights to LHR or anywhere else in Europe for that matter.

The YVR-YEG leg is booked. It just needs to find a replacement for the LGW-YVR segment.

As for humans, most of the time they know what they doing but sometimes you get the odd human that does not. Before COVID I was booked on a Delta flight connecting in SEA to Japan. The connection was canceled and it rebooked it connecting in both MSP and SLC with 15 minutes to make the overseas connection in SEA. Called Expedia and the response was, it has to be legal otherwise the computer would not have rebooked it that way. Since I was not taking that for an answer the Expedia agent reluctantly agreed to put me on hold while he called Delta. He came back say, "Delta is saying 15 minutes is not a legal connection for an overseas flight, who would have know".

Hopefully WestJet does better.

:haha: I don't even think it's a decrease in seat capacity compared to S22 on YVR-LON, or if it is, only by a pretty small amount. Covid screwed over YOW more than any other airport. People complain that YEG has little service because of YYC but YOW is a whole other level.

With regard to YEG being shafted by AC/WS, as we all know very well, all of these airlines are purely into profits and are not charities to give service to smaller Canadian cities. If there's some sort of a market that's apparently a goldmine, one airline or the other will eventually jump into it. Even when AC had much less international YVR service many years ago, YVR had a ton of foreign airlines for this reason.

As for YOW there's certainly a market for Europe. Wasn't LH going to take over FRA pre pandemic?

S22 is a poor comparison. The market is progressively recovering and they should be planning for s23 to be closer to S19. Back then you had BA with A380, AC with two flight and then a mix of WestJet and Air transat.

What looks to be happening in AC is using Dublin to fill some of that gap. With Heathrow slots so hard to get that may make sense.

Swoop just did some massive domestic cuts for January-April.

YHM received decreased frequencies on YHM-YHZ, YEG, YWG, YXX, YYT.
YYZ saw YEG, YLW completely axed; YHZ on a 2 month hiatus.

Over saturation of the domestic market over the winter is starting to show...


Flair also did some domestic cuts. Lynx did domestic cuts a few weeks ago.

It is a decrease. And not a small one.

BA was daily 469 seats to LHR in S22. Next year it will be 331 seats. That’s 30% less seats/week in S23.

WS was daily 320 seats to LGW in S22. Next year, BA will be 6x weekly ~330 seaters. Could be less as they have lower density B772s as well. Assuming it’s a 332 seater, that’s 11% less seats/week.

And this is assuming AC keeps an identical schedule as last year and upgauges one of their runs to the B77W like they did last summer. If they don’t, it’s an even bigger drop in seats. I don’t have the AC details but maybe nname can chime in.

The only way S23 to LON won’t be a decrease is if AC massively upgauges one or both of their flights to the B77W for most of the summer.

An interesting question would be is Swoop capitulating to Flair because of Flair is getting better loads/yields versus Flair or is Flair foolishly continuing flying these routes with poor loads while Swoop is being smart to let them go.

ICN increased slot for S23, and WS applied for the slot for YYC-ICN. Maybe they haven't got the approval yet?

https://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20221121000607


I had 2x 789 for the AC schedule last summer. Is that a last minute upgrade, or the 77W only operate a few days of the week?

Yes & I think WestJet will see how the Calgary YYC - Tokyo NRT 3x weekly Spring & Summer flights go before adding another Asia nonstop at some point on WS Boeing 787.

(If) WestJet were to add Seoul ICN,they're going to have to reduce the YYC - London LGW to 4x weekly to make room for ICN.

According to aeroroutes, the 400-seater B77W was to operate on one of the flights for a month.

https://www.aeroroutes.com/eng/220403-acns22intl

Flew through YVR on Friday coming down from Kitimat.

Last time through was during the height of Covid reductions. Hit the AC terminal at noon. could not find an empty seat. Last time through there may have been only a hundred or so people.

Charter service into Terrace is increasing in the new year. The work force at LNG Canada is moving from 4000 currently to 7000 later next year. Schedule service has not changed but the loads are full.

AC 737 max are real nice aircraft to be on.

Perhaps I was unclear.

Swoop and Flair are similar in concept, regardless of ownership. Which means cheap comes at a cost. I have minimal patience for that sort of thing at this juncture in my life, especially since I generally only fly for leisure and actually want to get somewhere instead of sitting at an airport terminal for my vacation. ULCC upstarts are very much of the 'You pay your money and you take your chances' variety. Maybe a decade from now, I feel confident enough in Canadian ULCC operators to take that risk. I don't when there's a bunch of new entrants bleeding each other out for the low-margin passenger at this juncture.

AC and Westjet are similar in concept for North America service. You pay more, but irregular operations don't completely mean you're sitting somewhere with no way to your destination or back home. One may be taking the scenic route, but one is getting somewhere.

My comment mostly reflects Westjet's (not Onex's) brand positioning and company strategy. I fully expect that at least one operator in a hugely saturated market will probably fold or have some sort of catastrophic meltdown in the next few years. And either AC or Westjet will be there to sell those passengers a full-cost last-minute ticket when this happens.

I wonder if Onex it's ULCC arm Swoop and dissolves it to focus on WestJet exclusively. I can see Flair surviving as it's the oldest of the currently operating ULCCs and not tied to a 'parent' airline like Swoop is to WestJet.