Tuesday, August 28, 2012

KLM Pack&Go Fare Specials from Calgary

KLM Pack&GO super deals
Fares include all taxes and fees
Valid for bookings until September 18, 2012. Departure from October 16 to December 14, 2012 or from December 25, 2012 to May 6, 2013.

Calgary - Amsterdam from 999 $

Calgary - Dublin from 999 $

Calgary - Larnaca from 999 $

Calgary - Dubai from 1 199 $

Calgary - Johannesburg starting at 1 499 $

Book online at KLM.com

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

British Airways Fall Sale

British Airways is having a fall seat sale with fare as low $399 before taxes and fees to Amsterdam, London, Paris and Rome depending on your Canadian departure point.  These fares can found for travel between Oct 2012 and March 2013. For complete details or to book visit BritishAirways.com


Thursday, June 21, 2012

Calgary Chinook Lounge to receive Priority Pass Highly Commended Award

Calgary, June 21, 2012 - Servisair was recognized today with a Priority Pass Highly Commended Award 2012 for its Chinook executive lounge located at Calgary International Airport (YYC) in Concourse D.
The Priority Pass Lounge of the Year Awards are designed to recognize service excellence amongst the lounges in the Priority Pass programme and are based on more than 40,000 ratings made by their members from around the world.
“We have a beautiful partnership with Servisair for lounges and VIP services around the world,” said Terry Evans, President, Priority Pass. “All Priority Pass members are frequent, discerning travellers with extensive experience of airport lounges so this is a fantastic reflection of the quality of service they feel they receive when they visit Servisair’s Chinook Lounge, Calgary.”
“We make it our priority to provide excellent customer service to passengers going through our executive lounges, and as such we are very proud of the recognition we received from our long standing partner, Priority Pass,” said Dale Flette, General Manager, Calgary, Servisair. “This award is the result of all the efforts made by our great and dedicated lounge team.”
“We are always thrilled when our partners receive accolades for providing a high level of service to the passengers at YYC, and we congratulate Servisair on this prestigious recognition,” said Don Kolsun, Director, Commercial & Retail Development for The Calgary Airport Authority. 
Celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, Priority Pass is the world’s largest independent airport lounge access program and counts millions of members worldwide. The programme provides frequent travellers with airport lounge access, irrespective of their class of travel, airline flown or existing membership of an airline loyalty programme. Founded in 1992 with 55 lounges in 49 countries, Priority Pass today offers access to more than 600 airport lounges in over 300 cities in more than 100 countries.  

Servisair is a market leader in the provision of common use airport lounges throughout the UK and Continental Europe and Canada, serving more than one million travelling passengers per year in more than 20 well equipped and stylish facilities. In Servisair executive lounges, business and leisure passengers can relax or work in a quiet place before their flight irrespective of their airline or class of travel. For more information, please visit www.executivelounges.ca

Friday, June 1, 2012

Great KLM Business Class Deals between Calgary & Europe for the Summer

Three SkyTeam airlines recently launched sales for Business Class tickets from Canada to Europe. Of course, KLM is the only one that serves Calgary, so this post is about their offers (if you want to see the other airlines see this post on Rewards Canada) My parents actually got on a previous KLM offer like one of these, Calgary-Prague for $2,500 all in. This time the prices are slightly higher but that is because we are also closer to the summer travel season. All of the prices below include all taxes and fees.

KLM Offers (all must be booked by June 5 for travel June 19 - Sept 10)
Edinburgh from $ 2 999
Oslo from $ 2 999
Geneva from $ 2 999
Birmingham from $ 2 999
Munich from $ 2 999
Billund from $ 2 999
Dubai from $ 3 499

To view/book these or other offers visit KLM

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Thursday, May 31, 2012

Earn Double WestJet Dollars between Calgary & Chicago

To help promote their new route between Calgary & Chicago, WestJet will be offering their Rewards members Double WestJet dollars on the route.  I don't have all the details yet but know that you will have to register for it (WestJet will send out an email with the invitation link) and you must register by July 15 for travel between June 3 and September 3, 2012

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Korean Air to codeshare on select WestJet routes out of YYC

Starting on May 31 Korean Air will be codesharing on a handful of WestJet flights that connect to Korean Air gateways in North America. These include Toronto, Vancouver, Los Angeles and San Francisco flights out of Calgary. The complete list is as follows:

Honolulu – Vancouver
Las Vegas – Calgary
Las Vegas – Vancouver
Los Angeles – Calgary
Los Angeles – Edmonton
Los Angeles – Vancouver
San Francisco – Calgary
San Francisco – Vancouver
Toronto – Calgary
Toronto – Halifax
Toronto – Montreal
Toronto – Ottawa
Toronto – Quebec City
Toronto – St. John’s NL
Toronto – Vancouver
Toronto – Winnipeg
Vancouver – Calgary
Vancouver – Edmonton
Vancouver – Kelowna
Vancouver – Montreal
Vancouver – Ottawa
Vancouver – Prince George
Vancouver – Regina
Vancouver – Saskatoon
Vancouver – Winnipeg

Source: Airline Route Updates

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

British Airways Business Class Sale: Calgary - London $1952 ALL IN!

To celebrate the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, British Airways is having a sale on Business Class flights to the U.K. from Canada. The price believe it or not is the same as the year that the Queen was inaugurated, 1952. Yes C$1952 including all fees and taxes for a round trip Business Class flight from any Canadian city that British Airways flies from (Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal) to London or Manchester.

The sale only runs until May 18 and is good for travel between May 26 and June 9, 2012

For complete details and/or to book please visit British Airways


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Thursday, April 26, 2012

Earn Bonus Marriott Rewards points at the new Marriott YYC Airport Hotels

Earlier this year Marriott opened up two new hotels that are actually attached to each other at the Calgary International Airport. Located on the Southeast end near the intersection of McKnight and Barlow Trails, the Courtyard Calgary Airport and Residence Inn Calgary Airport are the newest options for travellers who are transiting via YYC or for those who have early flights and want to stay near the airport.

Both hotels are participating in a new bonus points offer from Marriott Rewards that offer 1,500 Bonus Points per night (max 7,500 bonus points per stay) at 4 participating Marriott hotels across Alberta until June 17.
The Participating Hotels are as follows:
Calgary Marriott Downtown Hotel
Courtyard Calgary Airport
Residence Inn Calgary Airport
Edmonton Marriott at River Cree Resort
For more details or to book online visit the offer page on Marriott.com

A quick check of rates at the Courtyard Calgary Airport has this bonus offer pricing out the same as their standard rate so this is a good points deal (sometimes these points offers price out higher than the lowest available rates or standard rates)

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

New Aeroplan Bonus Miles offers for flights out of YYC

Aeroplan has released their next batch of flight promos with a big focus on Calgary this time. The winter promos they ran (Boundless Bonus Miles) did not have too many YYC offers and perhaps Calgary flyers complained or Aeroplan realized they ignored us or Air Canada is feeling the heat from other airlines on these routes or most likely it is a combination of all of these.

The first promo is for International flights including the recently increase Tokyo Narita route:

Between April 30 and June 22, 2012, register and fly on scheduled flights operated by Air Canada between Calgary and Tokyo Narita or London Heathrow and earn:
2,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles for every roundtrip or 2 one-way flight segments in Economy Class
5,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles for every roundtrip or 2 one-way flight segments in Executive First
Register Online (Registration is required)

The second promo is for flights in Western Canada + Seattle & Portland and is part of Air Canada's 75th Anniversary:

Between April 30 and August 31, 2012, register* and fly to earn up to 7,500 Bonus Aeroplan Miles on eligible scheduled flights operated by Air Canada and Air Canada Express (operated by Jazz, Sky Regional and Air Georgian) to these select destinations within Canada and between Canada and the U.S.. The routes and bonuses are as follows:

Calgary
Edmonton
Castlegar
Kamloops
Lethbridge
Regina
Saskatoon
Winnipeg
Medicine Hat
Whitehorse
Portland
Seattle


2 flight segments
3 flight segments
4 flight segments
5 flight segments
6 flight segments
7 flight segments
8 flight segments
9 flight segments
10 flight segments

575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles
575 miles




775 miles

775 miles


775 miles

575 miles
1,150 miles
1,725 miles
3,075 miles
3,650 miles
5,000 miles
5,575 miles
6,150 miles
7,500 miles
Register Online (Registration is required)

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Passenger Statistics: Jan/Feb 2012

The start of 2012 is very promising for YYC in terms of passenger statistics. While 2011 saw a range of -1.1 to 3.2% passenger number changes over 2010, this year is seeing much larger increases so far. Now, it may be a little early to say this will be a banner year for YYC after only two months of statistics (with one of this months providing an extra day of traffic: February 29th) but I believe the numbers can be used as a good indicator of where the airport and this city is heading as both January and February broke the million passenger barriers for the first time.

January
Broken down domestic and transborder traffic were the sectors driving the larger numbers with increases of 7.0% and 6.7% respectively while International traffic saw a decrease of 3.5%.


January 2012
Domestic 696,032
Transborder 219,733
International 116,947

Febraury
The large growth in domestic and transborder traffic continued in February but also saw International traffic get back into the positive numbers. The largest percentage increase of 13.1% came from transborder traffic while domestic traffic increased 7.2% and International 2.9%

February 2012
Domestic 673,249
Transborder 233,326
International 111,280

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Air Canada YYC-Tokyo Service now year round

At the end of February Air Canada announced that the non-stop Calgary to Tokyo service that has operated for the two Summer seasons will be moving to a year round service. As mentioned before the flight will operate 5 times weekly in the Summer and when it continues in the Winter season it will be reduced to 3 flights per week.

Source: Air Canada

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Emirates/Alaska codeshare. Another option for YYC-Dubai and beyond

Emirates, the (in)famous airline from Dubai will be starting service between Seattle and Dubai in March and while that news does not directly impact Calgary, their recent announcement of becoming a codeshare partner with Alaska Airlines does. Why does it? Well Emirates will be codesharing on Alaska Airlines flights between Calgary and Seattle for the connecting flight to Dubai. This means more competition for the all the Oil & Gas Travel to the Middle East. While British Airways and KLM attempt to take some of this business away from the stranglehold Air Canada/Lufthansa have for this traffic, this new option is extremely viable and with the right amount of marketing could change some YYCer's habit for flying to the Middle East. Emirates is aware of this and is making sure to price the flights competitively and here is a comparison of total all in pricing between YYC and DXB for a March 13th departure with a return on March 20th

Air Canada
Lowest price is $1611.37 in Tango (not Tango Plus) with connections in Toronto and Frankfurt; on the way back stops are in Frankfurt and Montreal. One stop flights via Frankfurt price out at $1810.85
Business Class: $8852.85 with stops in Frankfurt each way

KLM
Lowest price is $1620.87 with a stop in Amsterdam on the way out and Amsterdam/Vancouver on the way back.
Business Class: $8975.87 with stops in Amsterdam each way

British Airways
Lowest price is $1500.29 with a stop in London both ways.
Business Class: $8740.86 with a stop in London on the way out but a painful London and Dallas routing on the way back

and finally Emirates
Lowest price is $1257.30 with the stop in Seattle both ways.
Business Class: $9209.99 with the stop in Seattle both ways.

As you can see, EK is offering great pricing in Economy class however not as great business class pricing although some flyers would argue their business class trumps the other three airlines business classes and is worth the extra money whereas some other wouldn't. Also one thing to note is that I checked pricing for the first month of service where EK is trying to stimulate demand and will go up if the route proves popular. I will definitely check the pricing now and again to see if this holds true. One other thing that may make people avoid EK is that you have to clear U.S. customs to connect via Seattle and some may not want this extra hassle.

Emirates is also offering a Skywards Miles Accelerator bonus for the month of March between SEA and DXB, so for Economy you would earn a total of 21,000 Skywards miles between YYC and DXB or 73,500 Miles for Business Class.

They also offer a first class cabin (Private Suites) for the SEA-DXB route. Unfortunately there is no First or Business Class cabin on the Alaska Airlines portion between YYC-SEA. For more information on Emirates flights or to book visit them at Emirates.com

Friday, February 24, 2012

WestJet to start Calgary-Chicago service

As was mentioned by our reader BigTime in the comments of American Airlines dropping YYC-ORD service, WestJet will be picking up the route this May when they officially service between Calgary and Chicago.

The daily service will operate as follows (thanks to Airline Route Updates):
Calgary – Chicago O’Hare
WS1646 YYC1600 – 2015ORD 73W D
WS1523 ORD1830 – 2115YYC 73W D

Naturally, I would assume that American Airlines will codeshare on the route for seem-less connections out of their Chicago hub.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

KLM Official Press Release for YYC Daily Service

Although most of us have known about this since early December or so, KLM sent out an official release announcing the YYC daily service:


KLM INCREASES ITS CALGARY-AMSTERDAM SERVICE TO A DAILY FLIGHT
Montr̩al, February 22, 2012 РKLM Royal Dutch Airlines has announced it will expand its presence on the Calgary-Amsterdam route by offering a daily flight as of June 6, increasing its seat offer by 24 % over the previous summer.

Flights will be operated with an Airbus A 330-200 aircraft offering a total capacity of 243 seats: 213 in Economy Class and 30 in World Business Class.

After a 13-year absence from Alberta, the airline reopened the route on May 3, 2009 amidst the economic crisis. ‘We are pleased with our gradual increase in seat capacity strategy which now allows us to schedule a daily flight this summer. This confirms the destination’s potential and enables us to provide even more travel options between Western Canada and Amsterdam and then on to our worldwide network’, commented Fabien Pelous, Vice President and General Manager AIR FRANCE KLM Canada.

We are thrilled that KLM will be increasing frequency of their non-stop service to Amsterdam out of YYC,” said Stephan Poirier, Vice-President and Chief Commercial Officer for The Calgary Airport Authority. “Amsterdam is an important hub for business and leisure travelers and offers passengers extensive connections to the globe. KLM’s daily service expands our already extensive network of destinations, making YYC the gateway of choice for passengers.”
"KLM’s decision to increase flights to daily service this summer is great news for Alberta's tourism industry and for potential visitors from important markets across Europe," said Jack Hayden, Minister of Tourism, Parks and Recreation. "Added flights reflect the growing popularity of Alberta as a destination of choice for European vacationers. This demonstrates that the partnership between KLM, Travel Alberta, WestJet, Calgary International Airport and industry partners is producing positive results, and helping to expand tourism in Alberta," he said.

KLM’s 2012 summer program between Calgary and Amsterdam(Local times)
From
To
Flight
Departure YYC
Arrival AMS
Aircraft
Operating
Flight
Departure AMS
Arrival YYC
March 25
April 29
KL 678
15:20
08:15 + 1
A 330-200
Daily ex. Mon. & Wed.
KL 677
12:30
13:30
April 30
June 5
KL 678
15:20
08:15 + 1
A 330-200
Daily ex. Wednesday
KL 677
12:30
13:30
June 6
October 28
KL 678
15:20
08:15 + 1
A 330-200
DAILY
KL 677
12:30
13:30
 
KLM in Canada
KLM is part of the AIR FRANCE KLM Group and the SkyTeam Alliance. This summer the airline offers daily flights to Amsterdam from Montreal, Calgary, Vancouver and Toronto - double daily -, for a total of 35 flights per week. A KLM coach also connects passengers from Ottawa to Montreal-Trudeau. KLM’s codeshare with WestJet ensures connectivity to 10 additional Canadian cities: Kelowna, Prince George, Comox, Abbotsford, Victoria, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Regina and Halifax. -30 -

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Delta / WestJet launch codeshare routes

Once again it has been awhile since I posted on IFlyCalgary, in fact most of my work was on hiatus due to a family emergency in mid January and then when everything was better a nice vacation to Maui from Jan 23 to Feb 1. I will try to catch up on what is probably old news for all of our readers but feel I should post it anyways. The first news is the Delta/WestJet codeshare launch which I believe has expanded even further than the list below. The good news about this codeshare agreement is that it seems to be the first where you can earn WestJet Dollars on an airline other than WestJet (as long as it is booked through WestJet and carries a WS flight #)

These are the following routes that Delta started codesharing on WestJet when this launched on January 23:
Calgary – Kelonwa
Calgary – Las Vegas
Calgary – Regina
Calgary – Saskatoon
Calgary – Vancouver
Calgary – Victoria
Calgary – Winnipeg

Source: Airline Route Updates

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Alaska Airlines Redemption Sale: Save over 30% Mileage Plan miles on YYC-SEA

Alaska Airlines is running a Winter Award sale for their Mileage Plan program and the sale includes their flights between Calgary and Seattle. Each one-way award ticket can be had for 8,700 Mileage Plan Miles (regular is 12,500) and must be booked by January 10th for travel until Mar 7.

More details can be found here.

American Airline cancels Calgary - Chicago service

As of January 30th American Airlines will discontinue their service between Calgary and Chicago. Over the last few years this service has come and gone and now it is leaving YYC again. American will still serve Calgary from their Dallas Ft. Worth hub.

Source: Airline Route Updates