Canadians stranded at sun destinations in the Caribbean, Mexico and Central America due to data security breaches affecting Sunwing Airlines say the situation on the ground is chaotic and confusing.
Posted 12:44 pm
Updated at 5:54 pm.
Toronto Airlines said on Wednesday that it was continuing to manually check passengers after third-party service provider Airline Choice’s server networks compromised.
Many passengers are waiting at airports due to this problem.
“At first we thought it was a pleasure to spend the extra night, but now it does not seem fun to me,” said Canora, a camel., Resident Tania Cameron, who was in Varadero on Wednesday. In Cuba, waiting to board a flight back to Canada.
M.Me Cameron said he and his sister-in-law were in the seats on the sunwing flight that was scheduled to depart Winnipeg at 7pm on Tuesday. She said the plane was initially told it would be delayed until midnight, and that a sunwing spokeswoman had advised her to return to the hotel so that the flight would not depart until the next day.
However, when they returned to the airport on Wednesday, they found that the plane had departed in the middle of the night and that they had missed it. The two women still wanted to go home on Wednesday, but someone heard their story and proposed to give them their seats on the plane to Calgary.
“He’s a very good man, his name is Paul, MMe Cameroon. We have to pay for our own flights from Calgary to Winnipeg, but I do not care. We will find a solution. We have to go home. ⁇
Sunwing said it is working with other airlines, including WestJet, AirTranshot and Nolinar Aviation, to find additional flights to help reduce delays at some airports. The airline continues to offer affected customers a free one-time change of their departure date for flights scheduled between April 19 and 22.
Rupee Rana, a Toronto resident, said very little information was available to travelers, making it difficult to decide what to do. He and his wife have been trying to get home from Cancun, but have not been able to reach a sunwing representative over the phone and have relied on social media as their primary source for updates.
“My wife and I do not know when to leave the hotel and when to leave – we have already extended our stay at the hotel where we are staying for two nights. Rana testified that the fact that he did not know what was difficult. Some of us want to book with WestJet or Air Canada and get done with it, but it seems like a very expensive decision. ⁇
Rana said he sympathized with Sunwing and its staff as they faced this difficult situation, adding that he was surprised that there were no better contingency plans on the airline regarding the data security issue.
“I’m working on software, so I’m really surprised they were not well prepared,” he said. If your system has been hacked, you need to know this. ⁇
In an interview with CP24 television on Tuesday, Sunwing president Mark Williams apologized for the inconvenience caused by the interruption, calling it a “terrible situation.”
In a statement to the Canadian Press on Wednesday, Sunwing also expressed regret.
“We apologize to our customers for the ongoing delays and thank them for their patience and understanding in this unfortunate situation.”
“Security event,” said Airline Choice
Airline Choice – a third party whose systems have been hacked – is an Illinois-based company that provides airlines with a technology platform to streamline passenger processing, self-service and compliance processes.
In an email statement on Wednesday, the airline described the choice breach as a “data security event” that affected a limited number of computer systems.
“As a precaution, we have taken some systems offline to keep our environment safe. We immediately launched an investigation to determine the nature and scope of the event, ”the company said.
Airline Choice said it had already begun restoring functionality to its systems and would work day and night until it was completed.
Sunwing said the server issue has affected multiple carriers worldwide.
Sunwing passengers whose flights are delayed by more than three hours are entitled to compensation under federal air passenger protection regulations.
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