Aeroplan Refunding Transfers

Typically we always say that transferring points is a one way street. As the old famous saying goes, “no take backs”. Ok – maybe no one famous ever said it – but it seems fitting when talking about transfers. As typically you can never send these back once the transfer has been sent. It is for this reason that we recommend confirming availability before transferring your points to verify there are no phantom awards. That said, we have had a couple of interesting data points in the group of Aeroplan refunding transfers. Because of that, I thought I would share what happened with you all.

Setting the Scene: Refunded Transfers

I will set the scene here for our story. It is a story that is not too unfamiliar, you find the perfect award flight, you go to book it and BAM – an error appears. Unfortunately, you have ran into a phantom award. That is exactly what happened to our Facebook Group member, Claude H. Claude had been searching for weeks for a flight to Zambia to no avail. Finally, an award he wanted had appeared for booking via Air Canada's Aeroplan. In his excitement to get this booked, he forgot to call to verify availability or check another star alliance partner. Unfortunately, he was unable to issue his ticket. It was at this point that Claude called Aeroplan to see if he could get help, but no dice.

Seemingly, Claude explained that he had transferred his points to Aeroplan in the understanding that there was availability he had wanted. He may have expressed how this was unexpected, or frustrating. The odd part, however, is what the Aeroplan representative said in response to Claude. The representative told him that they would be willing to return his points to the bank. In this case, the bank in question was Chase. They gave him a rough timeline of a couple of weeks and sent him on his way to patiently await a reversal of his points transfer. Claude's original post is shown below.

Is This Too Good To Be True?

This is the part that is a bit of a head scratcher. During the waiting period, it's hard to tell if the agent was correct and the points will be coming through. For whatever reason, sometimes airline representative can give bad information. This could either be for a miscommunication, not understanding fully the rules of the airline, a training issue, or simply wanting to get you on your way. You may see us refer to these situations as a time to HUCA (hang up, call again). You can understand then why we could be skeptical when the Aeroplan representative claimed to do the impossible by transferring Aeroplan points back to the bank of origin. Or at least, what we thought was impossible.

The Data Points Arrive

After Claude's initial post in the group this is where things start to get interesting. A member who can relate to Claude's plight chimes in with a helpful data point. Dejan D explained that he encountered the same thing with an Aeroplan award. He shared that Aeroplan actually WAS able to refund his points back. Dejan wrote,

“I had the same issue with Air Canada and got my points back to [my] Chase account”.

This data point pushed us from skeptical to cautiously optimistic. Don't judge us too much for still reserving a bit of skepticism. But, you know what they say, if you have seen one data point of airline customer service, you have seen one data point of customer service.

Then, less than a week later – our original poster returns with the update we had all been waiting for. Claude came back on January 15th, just six days after the original post. Claude's update was,

“Just received my points back into my Chase account from Aeroplan! Now need to find a good Saver Reward!”.

It was curious that this update came so quickly, especially since the original representative told him that it would be several weeks.

What Happened Here

So this situation left us with some kind of questions. Transfers to travel partners are almost always a one way street. How was this transfer able to be returned? Well I think we can gather that Aeroplan appears to have a process to be able to refund transfers. I say this because in Claude's case, the initial rep told him that his points were refunded and gave him an estimated time it would be completed by. This leads me to believe that there is an internal procedure at Aeroplan of how to handle these transfer refunds. After hearing about these two data points, I reached out to the ToP Award Booking Team, and sure enough they had seen a data point of this, too.

Let me be clear, I do not think that this is a standard process that Aeroplan has for everyday requests. I do not think that you can simply ask for any old transfer to be returned. However, I think in issues where there is phantom award space and an upset customer, Aeroplan has a process to be able to sort out a transfer refund. I certainly would not count on this being available every time, and go about making transfers on a whim with the expectation that it can be refunded. Nonetheless, it does appear to be possible.

Aeroplan Refunding Transfers: ToP Thoughts

Transfers are widely considered to be all sales final. We were quite surprised when a member in the ToP Facebook Group reported being told his transfer would be refunded. We were even more shocked that Aeroplan actually made good on this promise. Aeroplan may have a process in place for handling refunds in cases of phantom awards and customer dissatisfaction, though such refunds should not be relied upon as a standard practice. Since this appears to have happened to multiple people, it seems more of a process than a one off exception. If you find yourself in a similar situation, there may be some hope for you after all.