Breaking: Airline offers low fares for musical instruments

This just in from Jean Saad, head of sponsorship and merchandising at Air Canada. It sounds fit for purpose.

Dear…

I am very happy to announce to you that Air Canada has introduced a new policy in favor of musicians traveling with instruments!

Effective today, customers may purchase a seat at a 50 per cent discount off any published fare, including the lowest Tango fares, to accommodate their musical instrument.

Also effective today, all customers travelling with instruments as carry-on on Air Canada, Air Canada Express and Air Canada rouge flights have the opportunity to pre-board ahead of general boarding to ensure their instruments may be conveniently and securely stowed close by.

I am also pleased to inform you that Air Canada has added Symphony Nova Scotia and the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra to its roster of Canadian symphony orchestras it supports from coast to coast, making Air Canada the Official Airline of nine of the country’s leading symphony orchestras.

Today at 11ET, our VP-Marketing Craig Landry will be making those two announcements in his speech at Symphony Nova Scotia’s Symphony Week concert at Halifax’s Stanfield International Airport.

More details:

We are happy to introduce a few enhancements to our carry-on baggage policy that will be of great interest to you if you travel with a musical instrument.

In addition to our current policy that ensures items which meet our carry-on size requirements * can be brought on board and stored in the overhead bins or under the seat in front of you, we now offer a 50% discount off any fare, including the lowest available one, to customers who would like to purchase a seat to accommodate their musical instrument in the same cabin that they are booked in.

And if you’re traveling with a musical instrument as carry-on, you will now be invited to board the plane during pre-boarding in advance of general boarding so you’ll have a little more time to store your precious possession in an overhead bin close to your seat. If you need help with this, our flight attendants will be happy to assist.

We take every care when transporting all of our customers’ belongings. But please remember that, because of their fragile nature, musical instruments should always be properly packaged in a rigid and/or hard shell container . This is especially important in the event that your musical instrument needs to be checked at the gate if it is not possible to accommodate it on board because of passenger loads, aircraft limitations or insufficient storage space.

Read our complete policy on travelling with a musical instrument.

* String instruments (e.g. guitars, violins and violas) can be carried on board – even if their dimensions slightly exceed our carry-on size limits.