Ottawa to outsource air passenger complaints to third party amid backlog

Ottawa has announced a plan to hand off the air passenger complaints system to an independent third party in an effort to reduce the large backlog facing Canada’s transport regulator.

In its spring economic update released Tuesday (April 28),  the Liberal government said it intends to adopt a European-style approach, where outside adjudicators handle complaints on issues such as refunds and accessibility, the Canadian Press reports.

This shift would replace the current in-house system run by the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA), which is currently dealing with a backlog of 97,000 complaints.

Air Canada pilot program

Earlier this month, Air Canada began testing a new process for resolving compensation claims through an external arbitrator as part of a pilot program.

For its test, the airline is inviting randomly selected customers to volunteer to transfer information from their outstanding CTA claims to an independent and impartial third-party ADR provider that will decide on their claims within 90 days after full information is received from both parties.

Outcomes decided under the pilot will not be binding on customers, unless they accept them, the airline said.

Following the pilot, Air Canada will evaluate the results and consult with government on possible next steps.

“Everyone wants a swift and satisfactory resolution when disputes arise over travel disruptions,” said Marc Barbeau, executive vice president, chief legal officer and corporate secretary at Air Canada, in a statement.

“To achieve this, we are proposing the use of ADR [Alternative Dispute Resolution] in Canada for air travel, an independent, fair and effective method to quickly and fairly resolve air passenger claims that is widely used in Europe.”

“As a first step, we have designed a limited pilot for a randomly selected group of our customers to transfer information from their CTA claim to ADR without any obligation to accept the result or give up their spot in the CTA’s queue.”

ADR is expected to deliver “a fast, impartial, and reasoned response,” Barbeau said.

Air Canada says it has consulted with Transport Canada and the Canadian Transportation Agency on the design of the pilot project.

While consumer rights advocates have expressed skepticism, both the airline’s initiative and the government’s proposal suggest growing frustration with the current system.

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