Beware Of Airline Trickery On Oversold Flight Credits As You Can't Always Get What You Want

Let me tell you a story about a bad airline experience . Maybe you can relate directly as, unfortunately, I think many of you can.

I won’t name the airline , but a few months ago, I was going on a four-day trip to Mexico with my son. As we approached the gates for a 6:30 a.m. flight in Toronto, the loudspeaker informed passengers that the flight was oversold and they were looking for volunteers to take the next flight, which was about 10 hours later.

My son and I weren’t initially interested, but we were near the desk and they leaned over and said they were desperate. They were offering $4,000 in credit , which got our attention. I asked if the credit expired, and they said no. I asked if the credit could be used by different family members, and they said yes. I asked my son what he thought, and he said, “Let’s do it.”

The airline kindly offered food vouchers and vouchers for a limo ride back home and a return to the airport later in the day. We thought we had received a pretty good deal. However, I know that airlines can be tricky. What could go wrong? Maybe nothing, but maybe it would.

After we got back from the vacation , my wife wondered if we might be able to use the big credit on business-class tickets for a planned summer vacation in Europe. I told her I would look into it.

Airline trickery No. 1

The electronic travel voucher we received “is not applicable towards the payment of taxes, fees, charges or surcharges.” I figured this might be a problem, but it still must cover a decent amount. The first thing I did was test book our flight to Europe. I put in the basic economy option.

The flight was roughly $800 a person. The price details were broken down so I could see the various taxes, fees, charges and surcharges. The amount for the base fare was $1. Could this possibly be correct? Could my $4,000 credit only cover $1 for each of us?

I checked some other flight options. Business class, for the low, low price of $5,000 a ticket, did include a base fare of about $2,000. So we had the option of paying $6,000 for two business class tickets and using up the full $4,000 credit. That wasn’t something we were prepared to pay, so back to economy.

Airline trickery No. 2

I went back the next day, and the algorithm apparently thought I might be interested in this particular trip and now the price was $880. The good news was that the base fare was no longer $1; it was now $50. As it turned out, $880 was still a good price.

I thought I’d better book this now, and at least I could use a bit of the credit. I searched and searched on the website, and while there were certain types of credits that could be applied to the purchase through the website, I couldn’t do so in my case. To use any of the electronic travel voucher, I would have to call the airline in order to use my small credit of base fare.

Said airline actively encourages you to use their website at every turn, but I had to call in this case.

This airline is well known for poor phone service. I called and was told the wait time would be more than an hour, but I could ask them to call me back when someone was available. This was 10 p.m. I took a chance and asked the system to call me back. At 3:30 a.m., the phone call loudly woke me up. I checked the phone. It was the airline. Not picking that up.

The next day I said this is ridiculous and booked my ticket online. I thought I would call back when I have some time.

Airline trickery No. 3

A couple of weeks later, on a Saturday morning, I called the airline and did the call-me-back thing. About two hours later, I received the call and spoke with someone who was very helpful in explaining how things work.

• Yes, the electronic travel voucher is valid and they understood that it was offered by the airline in exchange for us giving up two-thirds of a day from a short vacation.
• Yes, this voucher can only be claimed by phone. They were sorry for the long wait.
• Yes, the $1 base fare example is very possible, especially for non-North American flights. They said, “I am not telling you where to fly, but for your reference, if you fly to the U.S. or Canada, the base fare will be a higher percentage of the overall price.”
• No, they couldn’t apply our $50 base fare credit. This is because we bought an economy fare and it is final and can’t be changed. The best they could do was cancel the flight if it was within 24 hours and rebook with the credit.
• Yes, this is how it all works and they were sorry for the inconvenience.

All told, never do any favours for an airline. I feel scammed, cheated and treated like a patsy. I know that in the big picture, these are small problems and I am very fortunate to be able to travel. I just thought I would share so that you could learn from my mistake.

I can’t write exactly what I am thinking about this large Canadian airline . But I will politely say that they have a fair bit of room for improvement.

Ted Rechtshaffen, MBA, CFP, CIM, is president, portfolio manager and financial planner at TriDelta Private Wealth, a boutique wealth management firm focusing on investment counselling and high-net-worth financial planning. You can check out their 2026 Canadian Retirement Income Guide through www.tridelta.ca.

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