A Toronto family faced a substantial financial loss after Air Transat unexpectedly rescheduled their flight home from France to a day earlier without their prior knowledge. Nicola Lockwood had originally booked return tickets from Paris for the dates of June 11 to June 23. However, when she attempted to check in for their flight, she was unable to do so.

Upon contacting Air Transat, Lockwood was informed that their flight had been moved to June 22 and had already departed, marking them as no-shows without any warning. "This was quite a shock to me,” Lockwood stated. Along with her husband and two-year-old son, they were thrust into a predicament. Air Transat claimed they had sent an email about the flight change back in December, just weeks after the tickets were initially purchased.

Lockwood expressed her frustration, stating, “It was just an email sent so they couldn’t tell on their end if the email had been opened by me, and I have absolutely no recollection of ever receiving an email like this.” She noted that they had already spent $300 on their return flight with Air Transat, which was now rendered void. Consequently, they had to pay an additional $5,000, totaling closer to $5,500, to find an alternate means of returning home.

Gabor Lukas, a representative with Air Passenger Rights, emphasized that even if Lockwood had seen the email, rescheduling a passenger to an earlier flight is against Air Passenger Protection Regulations. He argued that such a change represents a flight cancellation, wherein the airline is obligated to provide alternative transport on the next available later flight, unless the passenger agrees to an earlier option explicitly.

In a written response, a spokesperson for Air Transat maintained, “According to regulations, moving a flight to an earlier date is permitted. Our obligation is notification and re-protection, which we believe occurred. No compensation is payable if notification is sent over 14 days prior to the impacted flight.” This stance was contested by Lukas, who insisted that passengers are entitled to reimbursement for their ultimate transportation expenses incurred while returning to Canada.

Moreover, he detailed that under European regulations, passengers would be due an additional 600 Euros per person if the airline failed to notify them of a schedule change at least 14 days in advance—an argument that included the Lockwood family.

Lockwood remarked, “Of course, we’d love to get reimbursed for the expenses incurred, but most importantly, I’d love there to be a change in their policy about how they notify customers about things like this.” She proposed a feature that would allow passengers to acknowledge or accept flight changes directly within the notification email.

When CityNews presented this suggestion to Air Transat, the airline did not provide a direct response regarding potential policy changes addressing customer notifications.