WestJet officially cancels flights between Moncton and Toronto starting in May

Travellers looking to head to Toronto from Moncton, N.B., have one less option at the airport with WestJet confirming that as of April 30, it will no longer fly between Greater Moncton Roméo LeBlanc International Airport and Toronto Pearson Airport.

“We just had it officially confirmed today,” said Greater Moncton Airport's president & CEO, Courtney Burns.

Officials with WestJet say the company is going in a new strategic direction and as a result, encore services between the two cities will be completely removed from their schedule.

“For the flights directly to Toronto for WestJet, versus what we were expecting, it represents about 14,000 total seats lost over the course of this summer,” said Burns.

Although disappointing, Burns says the news doesn’t come as a complete surprise since WestJet has made similar decisions at other Maritime airports.

“We understand this is disappointing news for our guests and the community and we sincerely apologize for the impact this may have,” said WestJet Public Relations Manager Denise Kenny in an email to CTV News on Wednesday.

“We have provided our guests with as much advance notice as possible either directly, or through their travel agent. Impacted guests will be provided with the option of arranging alternative travel arrangements or a refund to their original form of payment.”

However, the discontinuation of service is already impacting at least one Moncton couple who says they have only been offered travel bank credits from the airline.

“When I spoke to the woman about what I could do with this travel bank credit, she was just noncommittal,” said Ron Robertson. “I said, ‘You’re not flying out of Moncton anymore, so what good is it if I can’t get a flight with your airline?’”

Robertson and his wife have now had three cancelled flights with WestJet since 2020.

“The first one was because of the pandemic, which was understandable and I knew that was going on. But I still had a surgery to get to so I asked them if they had an alternative, like could they arrange for me to get through another airline or something else, and they said, ‘No, we can give you a credit,’” he said.

Air Passenger Rights Advocate Gabor Lukacs says they have more options than what WestJet is offering.

“WestJet is required to rebook the passenger on competitor airlines and if the passengers don’t want that, then WestJet is required to refund the passenger in the original form of payment in 30 days,” said Lukacs. “That is the law.”

“It doesn’t matter what the reason for the cancellation, as long as the cancellation is by the airline. They have to refund passengers in the original form of payment. That’s a no brainer.”

Currently, the Robertson’s have about $700 in WestJet credits and he says he’s been unable to fly with the airline despite multiple attempts in the last three years.

“No matter how I’ve tried, I’ve never been able to fly with them with this credit,” he said.

“That’s basically $700 in my opinion and feelings that they have stolen from me because they took my money for a service they were supposed to provide and they have still not provided it, and at this point, they’re not going to in the future because they’re not going to fly out of Moncton anymore,” he added.

Lukacs says there are steps that people can take if they are in this type of situation.

“First send a letter of demand to WestJet’s lawyers in the province demanding that they comply with the law as written,” he said, adding that if WestJet won’t rebook a flight within seven days, the passengers can book and keep the receipts.

“At the same time, I would also record the whole incident with evidence of what WestJet is saying on the phone to a designated enforcement officer at a Canadian Transportation Agency,” he said.

As for the future of WestJet in Moncton, there will still be some flights available on the airline.

“We are going to have a brand new service with WestJet kicking off in June, so three direct flights to Calgary each week and [two] direct flights to Edmonton each week,” said Burns.

In the meantime, she says the airport is always welcome to new players and, as always, is planning to work with airlines to improve frequencies and options when it comes to flying out of Moncton.

“The good news here from a Moncton perspective is we still have a lot of great options to get travellers to the GTA or the Greater Toronto area,” said Burns. “We still have flights with Air Canada directly to the Toronto Pearson, Porter flies to Billy Bishop Toronto Island and then we’ve got Swoop flying to Hamilton, so still lots of great options out of Moncton.”

For more New Brunswick news, visit our dedicated page.