Flair flight cancellation leaves Guelph traveller stranded, uninformed

Guelph man voices frustrations with Flair CTV’s Tyler Kelaher speaks to a man who says Flair Airlines left him stranded in Florida last year.

Andrew Mackay from Guelph says he was left stranded in Florida last year after his flight with Flair Airlines was cancelled without his knowledge.

In December he purchased round-trip flights from Waterloo to Fort Lauderdale. On the day of his return flight home, he got to the airport but the plane wasn’t there.

“[I] checked all day that the Kitchener to Fort Lauderdale flight was on time. They kept saying ‘it was, it was, it was,’” Mackay said. “The communication, I thought, was terrible.”

He said he was informed at the airport that the plane never left Kitchener and there was no flight.

“They had cancelled it but they never told anyone,” he said.

Mackay was offered another flight that wasn’t taking off until the following evening. Since he had to return home for work, he chose to pay for a second flight to Pearson International Airport, the same day.

He said he also had to take an Uber from Pearson to Kitchener.

It all added up to over $1,100, according to Mackay.

He said he was never reimbursed for the added costs and added that Flair refunded only a portion of the cancelled flight.

“I’m just not going to trust them anymore,” he said.

CTV News reached out to Flair Airlines and were told the company is looking into the situation and would get back to us. CTV News did not hear back from the discount airline by the time this article was posted.

"The miscommunication and the lying really. When they keep saying on the website that the plane is on time and it never even left. That's really unfortunate,” Mackay said.

Mackay said he travels to Florida once a month and plans to continue to do that but said it won’t be with Flair.

“They just don’t know how they disrupt people’s lives. It just happens a lot with them and a lot of cancelled flights,” he said.

Flair responds

Flair Airlines told CTV News the flight was cancelled due to maintenance.

“The safety and wellbeing of our customers is paramount and we apologize for any inconvenience the flight disruption caused,” Flair said in a statement.

Flair went on the say passengers receive regular communication updates through email and text.

“In this specific incident, passengers received three emails/SMS over the course of the delay,” Flair said.

When a flight is cancelled, Flair said customers are automatically rebooked on the next flight. In this case, the next available flight wasn’t until the following day.

The company said travellers can cancel for a refund if the new flight doesn’t align with their travel requirements.