Jason Huang says he and three older relatives were simply trying to get back to Toronto last August, when a routine check-in at the WestJet counter at Edmonton International Airport escalated into a confrontation.
“The manager suddenly grabbed my phone,” said Huang. “I was shocked.”
The family was wrapping up a trip to Banff, Jasper and Calgary and had already checked in online and printed their boarding passes. But Huang says at the check-in counter, a WestJet agent issued new ones for a later flight — without explanation.
When Huang asked why they were no longer on the original plane, he says no one would provide a clear answer. He continued to question the change, and was told the aircraft they were supposed to fly on had been down-sized and some of the passengers — including his family — had to fly several hours later.
Huang wanted to document this response so he could submit it with a compensation claim, so he pulled out his phone and began making an audio recording.
A WestJet agent can be heard telling Huang he will call the police if he does not stop recording.
When Huang refused, the agent told him, “You ’re not flying today.”
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After a heated exchange, Huang says the agent snatched the phone from his hand and tore up the group’s boarding passes.
He remembers thinking, “I can’t believe this is happening in Canada.”
Huang says when his father tried to record a video of what was happening on his own phone, the situation worsened.
In the video, the agent can be heard telling the group they have “no right” to record and to “Get this phone down!”
Passenger Jingan Huang was recording his son’s interactions with WestJet agents when one of the agents reached for his phone, telling him incorrectly that he cannot record.
The agent then tried to grab that phone, which Huang says resulted in his 73-year-old father getting hit in the eye, leaving it red and swollen.
A lawyer with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) says what he saw on the videos was disturbing, because recording such interactions is perfectly legal in Canada.
“Things are going to escalate,” said Tamir Israel, director of the Privacy Surveillance Technology Program at the CCLA, “unless the airlines systemically address this and make sure that all their [employees] very clearly understand that you cannot restrict recordings in these situations.”
Huang later requested compensation from WestJet under Air Passenger Protection Regulations, which WestJet denied, so he has filed a complaint with the Canadian Transportation Agency.
WestJet declined Go Public’s request for an on-camera interview.
In a statement, a…
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