Consultation on the requirement to identify a basic fare

The Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) is requesting comments from interested stakeholders on the basic fare requirement, including the circumstances in which an air carrier should be exempted from identifying a basic fare in their tariff.

BACKGROUND

The CTA regulates domestic air transportation pursuant to the Canada Transportation Act (Act) and the Air Transportation Regulations (ATR).

The Act requires that all Canadian air carriers holding a domestic licence have a tariff, which is a schedule of their fares, rates, charges and terms and conditions of carriage applicable to the provision of their services and other incidental services. Domestic licensees cannot apply any fares, rates, charges and terms and conditions of carriage to their passengers which are not contained within their tariff.

As part of an air carrier’s tariff obligations under paragraph 67(1)(b) of the Act, they must identify a basic fare for all routes offered by a licensee. The “basic fare” is defined in section 55 of the Act as:

(a) the fare in the tariff of the holder of a domestic licence that has no restrictions and represents the lowest amount to be paid for one-way air transportation of an adult with reasonable baggage between two points in Canada, or

(b) where the licensee has more than one such fare between two points in Canada and the amount of any of those fares is dependent on the time of day or day of the week of travel, or both, the highest of those fares.

EXEMPTION FROM COMPLYING WITH THE BASIC FARE

On January 30, 2019, the CTA, in accordance with paragraph 80(1)(c) of the Act, exempted Swoop from compliance with paragraph 67(1)(b) of the Act for a period of 180 days.

The CTA is undertaking consultations to obtain input regarding any future exemptions which might be considered and the factors relevant in determining whether they should be granted.

CALL FOR COMMENTS

The CTA invites interested stakeholders to submit input on the following matters:

• The prevalence of basic fares across differing business models in Canada;
• The relevance of a basic fare to passengers;
• The impact of the basic fare requirement on industry competitiveness; and
• Factors that may be relevant to the CTA in determining whether a carrier's compliance with this provision is “unnecessary, undesirable, or impractical”. 

Submissions can be made until April 13th, 2019 at consultations@otc-cta.gc.ca. PLEASE NOTE: the deadline has been extended to April 30th, 2019.

All submissions made as part of this consultation process will be considered public, and as such, will be posted on the CTA's website.

DETERMINATION HAS BEEN PUBLISHED

Determination No. A-2019-211