When brothers Roman and Robinson Peete tried to board an Air Canada plane at Vancouver International Airport earlier this month, they were refused because they couldn't provide the credit card used to buy the tickets.
That's because it was with it was their parents' card. Actress Holly Robinson Peete, known for her roles in everything from 21 Jump Street to Chicago Fire to Meet the Peetes (a reality TV show about her family), was in Vancouver shooting Our Christmas Journey, a Hallmark Film (it wrapped up production Oct. 9). Roman and Robinson came to Vancouver to visit and were headed back to Los Angeles on Oct. 4 when they were stopped by the Air Canada gate agent.
"The gate agent turned his back on them and refused to allow me to talk to him over the phone to try to explain that I paid for the tickets and I had the card," Holly tweeted.
Roman, 16, is still a minor.
"Apparently they were 'flagged' and were told since they could not verify this card they could not board and then the gate agent left them stranded at the ticket counter with no resolution in a foreign country," she writes in an Instagram post.
She and her husband (for NFL quarterback Rodney Peete) were unable to convince Air Canada to let their sons on the plane.
After being unable to connect with Air Canada she turned to social media; Air Canada has an active Twitter presence where they encourage passengers to contact them with issues, but they didn't respond.
On Instagram Holly noted her sons had spent the night in the airport and flew out the morning after
"I was very very upset, very disappointed, did not like the way they were treated, especially by that ticket agent," she said in a video posted to Instagram. "And then even some of the customer service people were unnecessarily rude and disrespectful."
She notes that she was particularly frustrated by the ticket agent who wouldn't speak to her when her sons had her on the phone and were themselves talking to the ticket agent.
Holly also notes that she's been flying with Air Canada for 35 years (21 Jump Street was shot in Vancouver) and has never had to produce a credit card.
"I'm still waiting to get a resolution from Air Canada," she says in her Instagram video.
Air Canada has not responded to Holly's tweets.
In her Instagram stories, she notes as of Oct. 9 there had still been no apology to her sons from Air Canada. She and her daughter are headed to Tofino for a short trip.
In a statement emailed to Vancouver is Awesome on Oct. 10 Air Canada calls the issue an "unfortunate situation" stemming from the company's security protocols.
"Sometimes legitimate transactions require additional verification when the booking is made in an unusual way, such as foreign purchases made outside Canada for last minute travel and these are identified by our automated anti-fraud systems," they state. "In this instance our fraud prevention team, which is not located at the airport and therefore operates impartially by only reviewing the purchase transaction, had a concern with the way in which the tickets were purchased for these customers and it alerted the airport agent."
The company says they've followed up with the family.
-- This story has been updated to include a statement from Air Canada.
