Air Passenger Rights with Gabor Lukacs

TMP 81 - Gabor Lukacs
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Jenn: Hey everyone and welcome back to the Travel Mug Podcast.

This week we are diving into something that you don't think about until you need it. Which is your rights as an air passenger. So we are excited to bring on guest Gabor Lukacs. He is the president, founder, and coordinator of Air Passenger Rights, which is an independent nonprofit organization of volunteers.

So welcome to the show, Gabor.

Gabor: Good afternoon. Good evening.

Jenn: So first and foremost, talk to us a bit about your education and your background prior to becoming an air passenger rights advocate.

Gabor: I probably have the most unexpected background for becoming a passenger advocate because I have a PhD in mathematics.

I did my B Masters in Israel, then came to Canada to do my PhD at York University in Toronto. And perhaps that's, you know, if we really wanted to tie my education to our passenger rights, that's the connection. Because having been a, an international student in Canada and traveling back to Israel and then to my Native Hungary to visit family was really how I was exposed to the airlines treatment of passengers and all the kind of problems and the kind of attitude where you're just being told, "Those are the rules" and, and, and when you ask them, okay, where those rules are written, then you get this long silence because the poor people there are just following some kind of corporate policy and they don't themselves know where it's coming from.

That's what's really kicked off my interest in, in passenger rights.

Meggan: And that makes a lot of sense. So I always feel too, when somebody has like an interesting background like yours, but ends up sort of doing something a little bit different, there has to be like an origin story specifically. So how did it all really start for you to sort of challenge these unfair practices with the airlines?

Like take us back to where that all began specifically for you, if you don't mind.

Gabor: Sure. The challenge, you know, it was happening kind of gradually, a broken suitcase here, a delayed baggage there. The, the kind of, the, the point where, where, where things began to change was when I was a postdoctoral, a fellow in Halifax at Dalhousie of the Kill postdoc.

And I was supposed to fly out a conference in Mexico and in the US in 2005. The airline actually sold a ticket from the Halifax Airport at the time where the ILS system, the instrumental landing system, which ensures that plane can land in a fog, was down for maintenance. They knew that there would be a runway maintenance.

They knew about it ahead. And of course, in June July, you cannot land in Halifax without having ILS in most cases, because it's a normal thing to have fog, no, nothing special. But the airline knew it in advance, and yet they sold the ticket. Didn't tell me anything about it until I showed up at the airport.

So it, it delayed me by 26 hours to my destination and I took the airline to small claims court. I properly served them and the airline just didn't show up. So I got a default judgment.

Meggan: Nice.

Gabor: And then, then the airline tried to get it set aside. The judge tossed it out and That's how it all started at a personal level.

My next experience was another conference that was flying at time from Winnipeg. It was a one day workshop where United cancel the flight. Probably because of some kind of maintenance issues with the aircraft. And there was another flight departing actually two hours earlier. I was there at the airport on time to take that earlier flight.

It was a different airline, but the airline actually, United failed to endorse or transfer my ticket to the different airline and I took it also to to small claims court day half trial. Because I asked for a bilingual judge, it was actually heard as at the first instance by a, a judge. She was a very, very Clever and nice judge, madam justice Deval. I was scared. I was extremely scared. My first major experience in, in, in superior court, and she was very fair making sure the course courtroom decorum that every witness got properly questioned. She interrupted me if I went off in terms of my too broad questions. She would very much interrupt the lawyer for United who was sometimes perhaps asking too, too broad questions.

And she really had no patience for the airline employee lying. They tried to concoct a story that somehow I was, I was yelling at the airport and I was able to prove it was not true because I had an audio recording of the whole interaction.

Meggan: Oh, wow.

Gabor: And she actually listened to it, the judge and, and was really displeased that they made up this story.

That was my first experience. I got only something like $80 because she ruled that I cannot get general damages under international law. And I lost even a leave to appeal application on that. So it was a mixed bag. But in terms of, of, of having my first courtroom experience, having a first time diving into the Montreal Convention International, that was it.

And while that case was still pending, I was awaiting judgment. I was flying back from Europe. I just saw this signage for Air Canada. The Air Canada baggage desk. "We take no responsibility for zippers handles feet wheels", which was completely unlawful. It's, it's against the law to disclaim liability because the law is that the airline is liable for damage to a baggage unless you know you have a, a suitcase made of glass, well, a glass suitcase.

The airline has the burden of showing that if there's a damage to baggage, it was due to inherent defect advice of the baggage. I challenged this policy before, at that time it was 2008. Canadian Transportation Agency was doing its job. They, they were, didn't have much complaints. They were just fair, kind of, you know, looking at both sides, hearing all arguments, making sure everybody has a chance to speak.

And they, after about, you know, 6, 6, 7 months roughly, they issued a ruling, which upheld my position, told Air Canada that they have to take off those signs, they have to change the terms and conditions, and that's how it all started. Right? In those days, the Canadian Transportation Agency was a forum that wanted to just ensure that airlines act legally.

I was not asking for any kind, anything special. To be clear. I was not asking to rewrite the law. I was not asking for anything radical. All I was saying is, here's a carriage by air act, which contains the Montreal Convention. It's an international treaty which applies to ratio between passengers and airlines.

If Canada is a signatory at the Montreal Convention, the Montreal Convention is part of the carriage by air act. It's has the force of law in Canada. Well then airlines have to follow it like everybody else. That's all I was saying. That's how it really started. And then there was more complaint about airlines policy on, on flight delays and flight cancellations.

And slowly I began to challenge airlines policies kinda step by step airline by airline, because most airlines do not follow the law.

They have policies which demonstrably contradict what the law actually says. And we are talking about international treaties and laws that were passed by the Parliament.

Jenn: Wow.

Gabor: That's, that's how it started out. More and more people came to me and asked for information. Then one of the passengers whom I helped really, really pushed me hard to start something on Facebook. And I thought, oh, who would care about it? And, you know, I made a few people and well, okay, fine, if you really think so. Sure, let's do it. And here we are, you know, close to 10 years, maybe nine years later with 180,000 members in our Facebook group.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Meggan: Wow.

Gabor: So it was really, it was really a case of organic growth, of just people who I was very fortunate to come into contact with, dropping ideas and, and maybe pushing me in the right direction. I'm very, very grateful for them. And then a couple years later we, we created a website in 2017. The big growth though, happened during the pandemic.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: Cause when airlines misappropriated passengers money, you know, there were all those flights that the airlines themselves canceled and refused to give passengers ca cash refund, even though the law said they have to do it.

Then in weeks, Maybe a few months. We had from 16 or 18,000 members, I need to check the old records, going up to 30, 40, 50,000 and, and it, it has been very much a period of exponential growth. Now we are actually trying to more focus on quality in terms of growth. So we do ask people questions.

We do want to make sure it's are real users. We don't want fake accounts. We don't want people to spam the group. And even this way, I confess that we have way more questions coming into our Facebook group than how much time we have to answer all them, all of them. It's very unfortunate and, and it shows really how much demand there is and how negligent the government is because in reality, part of what we are doing is what a functional government would do and should do.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: But in Canada of 2023, the government is serving their airlines private interests, not the passenger's interests, and that's the root of the problem.

Jenn: Yeah. I like if, if everything was working correctly, your website and facebook group wouldn't really need to exist. Right. Like,

Gabor: it, it's, it's it may still would have to exist because there are always errors. You know, I, I, I don't, I don't expect, I don't want to hold airlines to a standard of perfection. We, I just explained the follow the law and act in good faith.

Meggan: Right.

Gabor: Which is not happening. The problem that I was referring to is about the government, that what we are doing as nonprofit is, is something that in a normal environment, it would be the government's responsibility to put out sufficient information to passengers and to enforce passengers rights, and that's what's not happening. Canadian Transportation Agency has a history of misleading passengers about their rights of turning away meritorious complaints and telling passengers they have no case, even though they do, and I don't see any change here.

They weld actually a tremendous amount of power over airlines. They could fine airlines up to $25,000 per incident, per violation, per passenger. But those powers are rarely being used, and typically they just focus on low hanging fruits of, you know, not advertising prices correctly on the website, which I'm not saying it's not important. It is important because if the law says you have to advertise something in a particular way, you have to do it. So the rule of law is an important principle.

But when you compare it to issues like not paying compensation to passengers, well, how prices are being advertised somewhat pale to that. Their impact on, on the bottom line of the airline tends to be quite small.

It's more problem for passengers. While we're not paying compensation. That would actually have, if it was enforced kind of behavior modification effect. And that's why compensation and fines are so important. It's not about punishing airlines. I've never been advocating for punishing airlines for the sake of punishment.

This is a, it is a corporation. Airlines have no feelings. They're not human. They're not good or bad. They're like a machine. You don't want to punish your car. You don't want to punish your neighbor's car. You may want to ensure that your neighbor drives the car safely and no obeys the rules of the R road.

And if that means that for some violations, the car gets impounded for one week, let it be.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: That's the same thing about the airlines.

Jenn: Yeah.

Gabor: We, we did some calculation a while ago that actually in the current setup. It's way more profitable for airlines to disobeyed a lot than actually obeyed.

Jenn: Wow.

Gabor: Because there are so few fines, you know, you wouldn't expect. Here, here's question of the day. It's a, it's a nice mix between mathematics, economics, and passenger rights. I cannot deny my background. If there is a $400 compensation that the, airline has to pay to a passenger. Then how big of a fine do you have to issue to the airline that fails to pay one $400 compensation if the odds of the airline being caught is 1%?

Jenn: Wow.

Gabor: And it turns out that it's about $40,000. You have to fine the airline for just failing to pay a $400 fine. And, and you would say, well, that looks like a huge amount of fine. I mean, I could forget paying $400. Right? And, and, and, and you know, some people may forget filing taxes. It's not right. They obviously have to be, but you wouldn't be, you know, punishing someone who, who has a $400 tax debt, $40,000.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: So what is the difference here? The difference about enforcement is that airlines are doing this as a business model.

You don't file taxes several times a day, every day. If you did, then perhaps hefty fines would make a lot of sense. What distinguishes fining any kind of business that does repeatedly the same type of transaction? It has two choices; a lawful and unlawful choice is that you want to make sure that, that they put all their resources into ensuring that they comply with the law.

Because when you do all the math, if you find them less than $40,000 for one violation of $400 worth, yeah. It turns out that, that it'll be more profitable for them to just not pay at all compensation and wait until they get caught. And the math is going to show you that it's still going to give them a more favorable financial result at the bottom line than to comply with the passenger's rights.

Jenn: Wow. That, that's eyeopening and horrible. That that's what they're doing.

Meggan: Yeah. Yeah.

Gabor: It, it, it is, it is horrible. But I would like to, again be clear that airlines are not evil. Don't think of them as, as in, in this kind of anthropomorphic terms because it's not helpful. They, they are just, Optimizing profit in the circumstances that they have, right?

And right now, the problem with the government policies, the government policies are the ones that create a situation that the airlines, this is what they're doing is the most profitable strategy.

Meggan: Right. It's the environment they're existing in and they're putting it to their own advantage, essentially, is what they're doing and why, why wouldn't they?

Until someone starts you know, actually enforcing the fines or, or per, per individual. So that, that makes a lot of sense, sort of putting it that way where the downfall is.

Gabor: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. And, and, You know when, when you talk about corporations, a corporation doesn't take the maximum advantage of the environment within Legal limits is not doing its job properly.

Meggan: Sure.

Gabor: The way it is framed now, where the fining system essentially defined is just the cost of doing business.

Jenn: I wanna highlight your website because your website is an absolute wealth of information. And we just wanna like take the time to kind of highlight it. So, your website's mission is to turn helpless passengers into empowered travelers through education, advocacy, investigation, and litigation.

Can you talk to us about those pillars?

Gabor: Our main goal is to provide passengers information. Yeah, because information means power. Normally when you go to an airport as a passenger and you're being told, "sorry, your flight is canceled and we're going to put you in two days on a flight", you may feel helpless.

You may feel, I don't know what my rights are, what can I do next? But with information and with knowing where to find information, you are becoming more on of an, an even footing with the airline. Of course, there's still a huge corporation with lots of resources, but at least you can then, for example, document what you're experiencing.

That's documentation today means evidence tomorrow in court, right? And you can push back and you can open up on your, on your smartphone or your laptop, the, the regulations and say, "Hey, under section 17, so one you have to put me on in flight of a competitor airline in this situation, are you willing to it not willing to do it? If not, I'm going to buy a ticket on my own".

That gives you, that gives you some kind of, of power or maybe it makes you less helpless. I think that's probably the more accurate term in, in that situation. With litigation, we have some templates for passengers with respect to baggage damage, delay and loss some information of starting points.

We, we don't provide you know legal advice. We're not lawyers, right? We, we tell passengers where to find information and something that, that I often encourage people to do, and that's how I started out, is go to CanLII, the Canadian Legal Institute's website. It's like Google for case law and and legislation, and that's where you can look up the Air passenger protection regulations.

Don't look at what the government says, what the regulations say, that's bad. Because they're going to put their own spin on it. Go and read the regulations themselves. It does take some effort. It does take some legal literacy skills. I, I acknowledge that, but that is what, where you're really going to be sure that you get the rights correctly, that you understand how the system works.

And ultimately that's also when CanLII, where you can find case law, where you can find other decisions that small claims were adjudicators or judges previously cited, and then you can cite them as an authority, as an argument that we live in a precedent law system. In common law system in Canada, even Quebec is very much precedent based.

So, But Commonwealth system is completely precedent based. So unless you have a statute, and even if you have a statute, this is the way where this given court interpreted that particular provision, then there's good reason to interpret that way unless the other side comes up with a different reason.

It's always they try to push back, but that's where you find your ammunition. You know, it, it, it, it's a war. But a very peaceful civil, civil li or civilly fought war where, where, where your, your weapons are no more than than papers. You one weapon is your evidence. You make sure that you document everything that happened to you very meticulously, and you have to be ready for airlines concocting stories.

It happened to me, it happened to other people. And because there's such a financial interest, such financial incentive to make up stories, they will. The, the other part is other weapon is knowing that your rights, knowing the law. And that means knowing the regulations, knowing the statutes, and knowing the case law in and out of how other judges decided similar cases. It doesn't guarantee you to win because ultimately judges find the law for what they want to decide. In many cases, but it, but if you make a compelling case, like, look, we have been stuck there for three days, even though we're supposed to be on next plane. And then you're able to back it up also with case law, then you help the judge to make the ruling that they want to rule.

Meggan: Right. Right. That's excellent. And I think, I think just, you know, and I, I like, obviously you mentioned you're not lawyers, you're just really trying to point people with your website in the right direction to arm themselves in the Civil War, the war of civility, but with paper on how to get to the right place for them.

Obviously with no guarantees, but just at least if they have the information, they can make their own way and that. That kind of brings me as well to sort of, you know, actual real life scenarios that people might get into. So I'm sure people are out there going, but what about this? What if this happens to me?

So if you don't mind, we're just gonna step into that a little bit in terms of a common scenario and maybe how people should handle those if they're in a similar situation. Understanding, of course, every situation is different or unique, so that's, that's a given. But this is a generality, so we thought we would maybe play a little game about that, so.

Gabor: Sure.

Meggan: Um, Obviously loss or delayed luggage happens frequently. It's been in the news huge in the last year. We're all very aware of that could happen. So what should people do generally, again, if they land and their luggage? Is not there.

Gabor: Let's back trace to before you checking your baggage. I'm sure you know, you know those jokes about kissing your baggage goodbye and forth.

Um, So I normally recommend passengers to already have a packing list, just that they would know what they had in their baggage. Okay. If you are super concerned, even take photographs of things in your baggage and how you have packed if you're completely paranoid, take a video of how you're packing.

But that would be really, Overboard. Some people have been also using various tracking devices to know where your baggage is. That's not a bad idea. I, I have kind of mixed feelings about it because it's airline responsibility to track your baggage, not yours, but it has been good evidence gathering method.

Then when you go to your, to check in your baggage as the most important thing, your baggage tag, the, the airline gives you a piece of small paper like it, it's like a discard. It's a piece from the, you don't get, you get a tape that comes up from the machine that, that gets adhered to to your suitcase handle.

And that has a small end piece, which has a barcode and a, and a baggage number. It also shows you may want to check the routing of your baggage, which, which stops, which air ports is going to go. You may also want to check the tag itself. Does it match? Do you get, is it your, your baggage tag or somebody else's?

And that that small baggage tag is something you want to take a photograph of and, and guard it until you get back your bag, because that's your proof, best proof that you actually handed over your baggage. So now let's go at, at the end of the journey, you arrived and your baggage is not there.

The first thing is to report to the airline. The airline has normally a baggage agent. It may be their own employee or a baggage ground handling agent at the destination airport. You need to find them and report it. If you cannot find them. Documented you cannot find them. Take a picture of the, of the empty stall where, where they're supposed to be. Record your attempts, the audio of your attempt to, to find the baggage agent for the airline that you're dealing with. Make sure that you create some kind of evidentiary trail that the airline will not be able to claim that you just walked out without your baggage on your own volition. Now if you do track them down, They will likely ask you to complete some paperwork.

The color of your baggage, the size, the type information is likely to help the airline to locate your baggage. And they may try to just wanna take away the paper, take photos.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: Unless they give you a copy, make sure you have a copy. In many cases, they are for Air Canada they will typically give you baggage irregularity report number. Which would have the airline in the airport in the first five letters and then some five digits typically.

That's normally goes through the world tracer system where if the baggage is found in Katmandu, they can enter the information and, and it will match it up. And it, it's a way to make sure that you eventually get your baggage. Mm-hmm. In some cases in Halifax, I was flying in last fall and I came in and it was an airline that didn't have a world tracer direct entry system, so it entered system just several days later, which was annoying.

And they sent me the number later. It took 10 days to get my baggage, but

Meggan: Oh wow.

Gabor: First you complete the report, and then next thing is, what did you need for the purpose of your trip? You may be at a foreign destination, which is not your home, then you may want to get some clothing items. You know, the other ones, shampoo, whatever items.

It, it may be a nice dress and complete if you, if you need to attend an event. There was one case where businesswoman was going for a meeting. She, her baggage was delayed only 12 hours, but because the purpose of her trip was a business meeting, she needed clothing. The airline had to pay her many hundreds of dollars for just a short delay because she needed a complete proper business attire, which is perfectly reasonable.

On the other hand, if you're going to, you know, , to the beach, you should not be getting a suit unless there's a justification for it. So a baggage delay is not a license, not an invitation to, to go on a shopping spree. That's something that some passengers have forgotten and judges in BC have correctly criticized them for it.

It's not ethical. It's not right. What you buy, what is reasonable in the circumstances. The airline's liability is typically 2300 Canadian dollars, approximately per passenger. And you replace items as you go, as you can reasonably do what you need for the purpose of your trip. If you were coming home like I was coming home I had my shave electric shaver's base, you know, the, the kind of cleaner in my suitcase.

My shaver was in my backpack. The base was in, in the suitcase, so I had to order a replacement shaver base, and that was only my only expense if my baggage had not been found, in a few days, I would've probably had to buy also a suit because I had my kind of primary media suit in there.

Meggan: A fancy suit.

Gabor: Exactly. And, I would've probably had to buy some kind of tablet I use for doing mathematics for, for writing mathematical formulas. You know, we, I would have, I obviously wouldn't have purchased, you know, Underwear and socks immediately because I have that at home, but things I don't have at home, I can kind of reasonably start purchasing.

After 21 days if you don't get back your baggage, your baggage is deemed lost, then you replace its entire content in the baggage itself and then present it to the airline for payment with the receipts of the replacement items you you purchased. If you do get your baggage in less than 21 days, then you have 21 days to complain to the airline in writing and demand payment compensation.

So that's an important deadline that for baggage delay, it's 21 days from the time you receive your baggage, you need to complain. Now, if you get back, your background is damaged, then the damage you have to report within seven days of getting it, okay? That's another important deadline. If you miss those deadlines, you are toasted, you lose your right of compensation, right?

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: You, you ultimately have two years to sue in small claims court. You need to give the airline a notice. The idea is that the airline then is going to undertake some investigation of what happened, preserve records. It's, it's a bit tight. But I cannot say that it's completely unfair to the airline.

It's a balancing between airlines and passengers rights. So as do often happens, you present your list of items that you purchased and say you were reasonable and to the airline. And the airline says, well, we'll pay half of it because it's our policy. Then there's one thing to do, serve them with small claims court papers.

The law is clear if you have not gone on a shopping spree but have been acting reasonably. The airline has to pay for it up to this approximately $2300 Canadian dollar limit per passenger. Right?

Meggan: Right.

Gabor: If they don't do it, they want to hear from a judge, let them be your guests. What happens in practices is that often, when they know that you have been reasonable and they are served court papers, they don't want to waste the legal fees on lawyers, paralegals, and so on, they will just write you a check, but at that point, you already paid for court filing fees, serve service fees, maybe a process server.

They have to pay for that too. They make sure they pay for it. Don't just agree to a settlement at that point, which is just for your baggage issues, like everything the airline does wrong. If you act reasonably, they have to pay a price for it.

Meggan: Right, right, right. That is amazing advice, stuff I wouldn't have thought of.

And that already, that's gonna be super useful. Jenn, what's another scenario that we know is happening that we could get some more useful information for?

Jenn: Yeah, I think canceled flights has also been a big issue over the last,

Gabor: oh God,

Jenn: Is that the bane your existence right now?

Gabor: The problem with, with talking about it is that Canada has a subpar passenger protection regime, . In Europe, which has the gold standard. It's a very simple, straightforward matter. Rules are easy to understand. There are not too many sub cases and sub scenarios. The question can be answered somewhat automatically. But in Canada, the system was built by the government to fail. It was a failure by design. The, the airlines were holding the, the pen. And and that's, that's why, that's why we see a lot of problems now, and the government is now talking about fixing it in the budget bill, but I don't anticipate any kind of miraculous major breakthroughs.

Anyway. Let's, let's try to kind of unpack what exists in with flight cancellations.

Should we confined to flights within Canada or international flights. What, what do you, what do you feel international flights you have,

Meggan: let's about's tackle, let's tackle canada. I know that there's so much more that we could talk about, but we have to pick something, so let's go with that.

Gabor: Okay. Yeah. So, so let's suppose that, that you were flying, traveling entirely in Canada, so it's not like a connecting flight. But say you fly from Halifax to Toronto, Toronto to Calgary, so it's entirely travel in Canada. You get a, a message your flight was canceled. So a couple of things. They airline is supposed to tell you the reason for the cancellation.

And under Canada's subpar system, there are three types of reasons. One is, Outside the carrier's control. It'll be like a weather, volcanic eruption. And that's, that's really sympathetic too. Then there are those situations which are called within the carrier's control, but required for safety reasons.

So if the aircraft breaks down two hours before the takeoff. Sudden problems, would fall in that category. And then there's a third category, which is within the airlines control and not require for safety reasons. And the rights are very different depending on which category you are in, and plus, there's also a factor, whether it's a small carrier or a large carrier, which depends on how many passengers they transport.

This is this. This already gives you six different scenarios, right, for one flight cancellation.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: That's what makes this system completely unworkable because we, we don't have on our website an actual guide for flight cancellation or delay within Canada for this reason. It just too messy, too complicated.

It's impossible to deliver it in a, in a reasonable way. But let's, let's try to kind of break it down. Let's assume now that it's one of the large airlines, Air Canada, WestJet, or Swoop, the sort of large airlines current in Canada. You know, Sunwing was bought by WestJet, which is going to be an interesting situation, but let's just focus on those three.

So your fight has been canceled. Scenario one. There's a snowstorm in Halifax. Other airlines also cancel their flights is clearly outside of carriers control. Then there, all the airline has to do is to offer you either a rebooking within 48 hours on its own flights, or if they cannot do so then, then a rebooking on flights of other airlines.

If they don't have a flight on, on their own network or partners within 48 hours. You can choose not to fly. You can say, you know what? The snow storm, just gimme a refund, and they have to give you a refund in the original form of payment. The Air passenger protection regulation is ambiguous about it.

It was poorly written, and if you read, it sounds like they can actually keep your money. If they offer you a flight within 48 hours, it's not the case. Common law would still apply. You didn't get the service you paid for. They have to give you a refund. That's not- if you don't take the service. You don't have to pay for something you didn't use. That's common sense.

But in the case of something which is outside the carrier's control, there are very limited rights, no meals, no accommodation, which something that you would be entitled to in the European Union if you were flying, say, from within Germany. Even if it is volcanic eruption.

Second scenario the flight broke down because They got an oil leak two hours before the flight. It's categorized if you believe what the airline is saying, which is always a question. You know, some, sometimes, sometimes used car sales agent look like very reliable people compared to the airlines.

They, but it suppose that you, you have actually seen the repair people we spoke to them can see the mechanics going through the plane repairing. It's obvious that it's happening. Or the pilot told you and pilots are actually, you know, they are reliable, decent in chaps normally. So they, I would ask them probably if I were in that situation.

And if the pilot told you, okay, it was hydraulic oil leaking, we need to fix it, that would be something within the carriers control, but required for safety reasons, obviously cannot fly with, with leaky oil. So then the airline would have to either rebook you on its own network within nine hours.

So, Or book you on flights on one of it's competitors. It has to be always as quickly as possible. So then I cannot say, well, we have a flight in 36 hours. We are going to put you on that. If you have a flight on a competitor airline, which departs earlier, then once, what they, the airline offers is outside of nine hour window, they have to rebook you on that.

It doesn't happen in practice. The airlines have been systematically violating this rule. Not a single time they have been fined for it. They're managing to evade that, it's a serious problem.

Meggan: Wow.

Gabor: Because this, this is, this is what I, I'm finding so frustrating in passenger rights that the laws are there. Even though our APPR, the passenger protection regulation are incredibly weak and, and toothless.

This particular right of rebooking on a competitor is black and white in the statute, in the regulation of the statute, but, Airlines just shrug and don't do it in many cases and get away with it. What else you're entitled to in that situation of say, maintenance issues? Unexpected maintenance issues is meals and overnight accommodation if needed.

Okay. That's, that's what you don't get in this scenario, is a lump sum compensation. Now also in this case, you don't have to take what they offer you. They can just say, you know what? I don't wanna travel. Give me a refund, and then I have to give you a refund in the original form of payment and refund you Also any ancillary fees, like, like seat selection fees, baggage fees, whatever you paid.

In addition, say you were flying from return ticket from Halifax, Toronto, Calgary. You get stuck in Toronto. That's where the cancellation happens, and you say, you know what? I wanna just be back in Halifax. They have to provide you a free transportation to Halifax. And the full refund also of the Halifax Toronto segment because it does not serve any purpose for your travel itinerary, for the purpose of your travel.

Meggan: Oh!

Gabor: Now the, the most favorable situation to passengers, which is rare and airlines always denied it happens, is when it is within the carrier's control and not required for safety reasons. And then on top of what I told you, they also have to provide you a lump sum compensation of up to $1,000 per passenger, depending on how long they delay caused by the cancellation is, if they didn't notify you at least 14 days in advance. Also, if you decide not to travel, then they have to give you a $400 compensation.

It sounds like, you know, and it sounds good in the paper. Nice. The problem is that the way it is set up is that you get compositionally as residual class or category of Within the carriers control, but not for safety reasons and proving it is very document intensive, very evidence intensive.

Airlines will deny it and airlines will tell you that even when their own crew is not available and they just don't have pilots or or flight attendants, that's a safety issue. The law has been in, and even the Canadian Transportation Agency ruled that. It is not a safety issue in general, that they have to plan properly and that they cannot just blame everything on safety, but the airlines just disregard it.

This is one of the many flaws of this regime that we have been forewarning the government about. I testified before the House of Commons transport Committee in 2017. I said, it's not going to work. 2019 I testified before the Senate Transport Committee. I said, it's not going to work. In 2019 we published Air Passenger Rights 52 page report on the shortcomings of the proposed passenger protection regulations, and we predicted what would happen. All of our major predictions have proven to be true in the past, you know, four years.

Jenn: Wow.

Gabor: So, And it's not that I have here at Crystal Ball, you just simply knowing how the airline industry and, and air travel industry works and what type of interactions you have in your real life.

The, the fundamental problem with this type of regulatory approach that the government has been taking is, is written by people who have been sitting all day long in their office. They travel a few times on their own, but they have not seen day in and day out what it really looks like to work with passengers, to, to deal with passenger airline interactions.

They, they're clueless about industry and their only source about industry is the airlines themselves. You will be surprised how often the Minister of Ministerial staff may be meeting with airline executives. It doesn't happen with passenger advocacy, consumer advocacy community.

Meggan: Okay. I didn't know that this conversation was going to make me feel so angry.

I guess I, and you know what? I have to be really honest and like, knock on all the wood I can find. This has not affected my life ever, and I've traveled a lot. I've, I've been super, super fortunate. But hearing this makes me know now that I need to care about it because if it can happen to someone beside me, it can happen to me.

So I think that that's why this conversation, having you on is incredibly important because we have to think of the bigger picture. Not just to us as individuals. Well, this has never affected me. I'm probably good to go, hopefully forever. So that's not necessarily the case, and I think that that's why this conversation is important.

So I think what I'd like to understand from you now, your vast experience that you have with this, what would you say then, whether it's someone like me who's never had a big issue, or someone who's, you know, unfortunately had a few things happen to them. What would be your biggest piece of advice you would give someone to prepare them for unforeseen circumstances with an airline, if you can narrow it down.

Gabor: It is difficult to prepare people for it because one thing that that makes Canada such a wonderful place to live in is that we are generally kind to our neighbors.

That we don't assume that our neighbor deliberately did something that annoys us. We may ask. We are patient, we are, we are extending a lot of courtesy to each other as a general rule.

Meggan: Yes.

Gabor: And airlines abuse us for that. Airlines in Canada abuse that specific Canadian cultural trait that, that they want us to treat them as a corporation as if they were our neighbors. But they're not.

It has also a flip side, for example, when a passenger has to cancel their flight for some reason, and, and I'm talking about the reasons that are really there within their own life situation. They, they have a broken leg and so on. It's not the airline's responsibility anyway and, and I always have to tell passengers, look, this is insurance matter. Not the airlines matter, but passengers based on the same kind of Canadian cultural reflexes say, well, I'm gonna tell the airline I broke my legs, so I'm sure they're going to be nice and, and let me change my ticket. No, it doesn't happen. It rarely happens. Which is fine. I I have, I don't expect airlines to be generous. Airlines are machines, not humans, but airlines want Canadians treat the airline if the airline was a your neighbor, and they are not. They are machines. They are, they are. And they are sometimes vicious machines because of the way they're built, like any other corporation, it's not, it's not specific about airlines.

It just, If you have a bad regulatory environment, you have a good corporation that maximizes profit is the recipe for a potential disaster. Because it is going to cut corners wherever they can. It doesn't matter whether you are in their way or not. So the most important advice to to passengers is be nice to the person at the counter, of course, because they are your fellow citizen, fellow Canadian. Be patient with them. Be understanding with them, but don't. Be patient with the airlines nonsense as a policy.

Meggan: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: Did they tell you it's our policy? The answer is no. This is the law. If they refuse to obey the law, take them to small claims court. Have a mindset that in every situation , it could end up in litigation.

Your documentation today is your evidence tomorrow.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: And be ready, have, if anything, ever so slightly goes wrong, have on the cap the mindset that, okay, I'm gathering now evidence to convince the judge tomorrow that I was wronged here, that I did everything reasonably here. I was acting good faith here, and yet I was mistreated. That's where you want to position yourself.

The other day I was contacted by a passenger who who, whose relative had an allergic reaction flight. And I'm not going to mention which airlines, it doesn't matter. It wasn't a Canadian airline actually. And, and the passenger was sure, and based on what I heard, that it was not a cross-contamination issue, but rather another issue that they gave the allergy issue to the airline, but they weren't properly paying attention to it.

When it actually came down to me asking the passenger, I believe you, I told the passenger, but how can you prove it? There was no evidence.

Meggan: Mm.

Gabor: And, and, and that's often a problem,

Jenn: right.

Gabor: The advice I would give passengers is first and foremost, make sure to watch what happens to you, but also make sure to what happens to other passengers.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: On, on board an aircraft when you see some kind of argument, altercation. You don't know whether is the airline employee giving a power trip to a passenger or a passenger being drunk and abusive? You don't need to know. You don't need to take sides. But if you see any kind of problem, take out your smartphone. Start recording, start documenting. It'll not be for you to, for a judge to eventually decide who did what. What do we have seen? Many cases of drunk passengers. We've also seen cases of, of an airline employee physically assaulting a 72 year old grandmother on a plane.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: Both things happen.

Documenting things is not evil. It's actually helps law enforcement to have a silent witness and, and, and undisputable evidence of what actually happened.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: So I guess my bottom line is, I know that you want to just enjoy travel and have fun, but when you deal with these situations, be cautious. Have the mindset that this could go wrong and you may be in a situation, you have to prove something.

Meggan: Mm-hmm. Right.

Gabor: It's, it's sickening and it's sick in a way. It, it's not a healthy, it's not a healthy situation. And that's, that's one of the reasons why people are so upset with airlines.

Jenn: Yeah.

Gabor: Because when you go on vacation, you don't want to travel. With the mind of having a lawyer on your left and a journalist report on your right.

Meggan: Right, right.

Gabor: But often it appears that you have to do it, and if you're not prepared, you may be caught in a situation where, where it's your wording against the airlines and that puts you in a vulnerable position.

Yes.

So overall, overall, in terms of my advice be nice to individuals, don't have any kind of, Sense , of humanity with respect to the airline as a corporation.

They're not humans. It's just a machine. And the same way you would not have any comms to, to have a car on your driveway towed away. You should have no inhibitions from holding an airline as an, as a corporation accountable for what they have done.

Jenn: That's, I think that's really important to acknowledge that the people at the airport deserve respect because I've definitely witnessed people being not very nice, and I know, you know, I get that you're frustrated and you're, you don't know what's going on and you're just trying to figure out what to do, but yelling at the person at the desk is never going to get you what you, what you need. So don't do that.

Meggan: Yeah.

Gabor: It, it's true. I sometimes you have to be assertive.

Jenn: Yeah.

And finding it right

Meggan: balance.

Gabor: Right balance it. Right. That, Bright line between yelling and being assertive is, is, is important.

Jenn: Yeah.

Gabor: But don't be a pushover either.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: Just, just recently when I was flying from Halifax to Budapest there was some issue with my baggage tag. Coming back to the, they, they somehow told me they weren't able to issue an electronic baggage tag all the way from Halifax to Budapest. There was some issue of two airlines not having some agreement with between them.

I pretty much told 'em, look, it's not my problem, so solve it. I mean, I, I, I helped them to, I, I. Then what worked with them to find a problem. But I was not taking a no for an answer because I had a ticket which said all the way from Halifax to Budapest, I don't have to pick up my baggage. It's not part of the contract.

There is not, not normal business. And eventually issued a manual baggage tag, which made it eventually to Budapest, no problem. But I, I kind of had to give them that push that, okay, this is not right. I'm not going to accept, no, let's work on it together to fix it.

Jenn: Right.

Gabor: And I, I actually suggested, I told them, like I, I kind of led them to the answer like, okay, what would you do if your, your computer broke down?

How would you prepare it on the baggage tag? Well, you'll do it manually. Okay, then why don't we do it manually?

Meggan: Why don't we try that?

Gabor: Exactly. And at the end, one thing which is, which is, which I would like to mention as, as, as an important thing, often people sometimes forget when things got solved. I very profusely, thank them for it.

Meggan: Mm-hmm. Right.

Gabor: Because they were willing to show flexibility. They were willing to think outside the box a little bit. They did a good thing. I cannot tip them. I cannot pay them. At least I can give them the little thing of, okay, you did a good thing today, buddy, and that's, that's important to do. At the same time, I didn't take no for an answer balancing between the dealing with the individual and dealing with the situation.

Meggan: Mm-hmm. I like that.

Jenn: Yeah, I love that. For sure. So since we are a travel podcast, before we let you go why don't you share with us maybe one of your favorite travel destinations and somewhere that's maybe on your bucket list that you haven't been to yet?

Gabor: Hmm. I don't really have a bucket list, per se for, for travel. You know, I, I have family in, in Hungary, so for me, when I'm in Hungary, it's, it's a situation to almost, I don't want to, to even leave to a nearby country if I don't Absolutely have to because it's, it's nice to, to, to be around my family. But in, in terms of, in terms of my travel experiences when within Canada, I really love St.

John's. It was, it was, you know, if before I moved to, to Halifax I also visited there and, and I mean, Halifax has always been my kind of most favorite place since 2005. No, you know, hands down. But, but St. John's is, is, is probably, comes next to it very, it has a very special atmosphere and very nice scenery.

And people are really, really, really kind. That's, that's, that's really what appealed to me many years ago to move to, to Halifax in Nova Scotia. The, the kind of sense that you get with, with interaction with people where everybody treats you like you were your second cousin.

Jenn: Yeah.

Gabor: And and especially as someone who was not born in Canada I, I found it very, very welcoming.

People have been telling me stories that if maybe in, in outside of Halifax, you may, you may be someone who came from far away. I didn't sense that in, in Halifax, I can tell you that. I, I found it very welcoming and very very, very, very kind of relaxed.

Jenn: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: So, I, I do appreciate it's, it's, it's unfortunate we all lost a little bit of that during the, the Covid pandemic.

It's, it's, I hope that I, I'm, I'm not sure what we can do to regain the same level of laid back attitude that we had before, but certainly it, it's, it's an. Atlantic Canada, Haligonian and Nova Scotian value that, that I, I really, really greatly cherish and, and, and value. So, yeah I, I guess, I guess within Canada that would be my mean.

Halifax is, is is home. But St. John's would be, would be a nice, nice place. In terms of where I would know travel destination I want to go. I, I, I have traveled enough in many, many ways, you know, with, with, with having family and traveling sometimes twice a year between Europe and, and Canada.

It, I don't have this kind of urge to travel, per se, if I go for a conference or for an event or something, which has a purpose. Sure. I'm not having an aversion for travel, but it, it's not, it's not like I would, I'm crazy about, oh, where could I travel? You know, here at Hungary I would get a bike and Go out and, and have a bike ride on the, on the next to the Danube.

I, I don't really.

Meggan: Sounds good.

Gabor: Yeah. I can't really wish more for that and I, and I don't, because I was born here, I don't think of Budapest or Hungary its kinda touristic attraction. I like pretty sites. When I, when I go here to, to the Danube and I just look up the mountains on Budha, it's, it really looks amazing.

And, and, and, but, I don't, with the eyes of a tourist, I don't go up the, the castle and, and take photographs. It's just like, oh, well is that another, another thing in my city?

Jenn: Yeah.

Gabor: So I, I much more like the, the kind of, the kind of natural nature and, and, and forests and, and bike rides. Recently my family we, we took a car trip to Slovakia to, to, to a smaller town. And, and that it was very pretty in a way. The town was very pretty. The, the museum and the castle was very pretty. And, and the road itself was beautiful. It was going through mountains and, and it was almost as good as, as, as the visit itself. So I'm probably not the best person to, as a travel blogger because I

Meggan: takes all kinds.

Gabor: I, I love, I love museums. I love, I, I, I don't think, you know, if I want to know what a country really is like, I don't think I can do it in a couple hours or a couple days. Then, then you need to go to the library, learn about it's history, sociology its politics. It's, it's, and, and its language, ideally.

Meggan: Mm-hmm.

Gabor: That's how you really learn about a country. I, I find it a little bit superficial and artificial to, to claim that that one can learn about, about a country that swiftly.

Meggan: I completely agree. My husband is very much into research and then visit, or we visit and then he researches because he fell in love with it there.

So one or the other. But I have to say Budapest is definitely on our list. So I will be visiting and I'll hit you up if I need some pointers. In regards to Hungary, cuz it's definitely on our list.

Gabor: Lovely. If, if you visit maybe. We should do another podcast here, right? In Budapest.

Jenn: Yeah. I mean we should, I think.

Meggan: I think it's a date. For sure. Well, thank you so much for coming on. This has been so helpful, even just for us, but I can't imagine how much help it's gonna be for our listeners. Like we said earlier, your website is a true wealth of information. So we will link that in the show notes. You also have a, a Facebook group that you referenced as well where people can also get more information.

So we'll make sure to link that in the show notes as well. But we know you're in Hungary like we've mentioned, so thank you for taking the time out of your schedule to chat with us.

As for our listeners, thank you for listening, obviously, each and every couple of weeks to the Travel Mug Podcast.

You can find us on Facebook and Instagram at Travel Mug Podcast our website, travel mug podcast.com. And obviously on our YouTube channel where you can view this actual podcast and see our lovely faces. And if you'd like to support this show, you can buy us a coffee. That link is also in the show notes or leave us a review on Apple or Spotify or share the show with someone who loves to travel as well.

So Gabor, again, thank you so much we appreciate your time and bye everyone. We'll chat again soon.

Jenn: Bye.

Gabor: Thank you very much for having me.

Meggan: You're welcome.