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Lap infant award ticket prices vary widely between programs, but Air Canada’s Aeroplan is going from being one of the best options for lap infant award tickets to the hands-down best program for lap infant award tickets with the program changes coming on November 8, 2020. Starting on November 8th, lap infant award tickets will cost just $25 Canadian dollars or 2,500 miles one-way. We have confirmed with Aeroplan that this applies to all classes of services and partners.
Sweet spot spotlight:
- The short story: Air Canada’s New Aeroplan (starting November 8, 2020) allows you to easily add a lap infant to your reservation using either money or miles at fantastic rates.
- Miles required: 2,500 OR $25 CAD
- How to find awards: You can add a lap infant to your existing award booking (no need to search for special availability)
- How to book awards: Book over the phone with Aeroplan at 1-800-361-5373
Quick Notes
Adding a lap infant to an award ticket reservation normally requires calling the ticketing carrier. In other words, you contact the airline whose miles you used to book the award ticket (in most cases), not the airline operating the flight(s). Many airlines charge 10% of the adult revenue fare and taxes to add a lap infant. While that’s often not so bad in economy class, it can easily equate to hundreds of dollars in business or even a thousand or more in first class — to have a baby sit on your lap for hours.
Air Canada’s Aeroplan was already one of the few airlines that allowed the redemption of miles for an award ticket, and their prices were great (and even better in cash given that you would pay, at most, $125 Canadian dollars in first class whether one-way or round trip). But it’s getting better: beginning on November 8, 2020, lap infant award tickets will cost just 2,500 miles or $25 CAD. A lap infant award ticket in international business or first class for twenty-five Canadian dollars is fantastic. Compare that to paying 10% of the adult revenue fare (which I paid a few times for my first son) and the savings is hundreds of dollars.
This policy seemed almost too generous to believe, so we reached out to our contacts at Aeroplan to confirm and they confirmed that this “applies across cabins and across partners – coach all the way through first“. This is an amazing deal. Given that the current exchange rate puts the value of $25 CAD at less than $19 in US Dollars, I would be thrilled to pay that price and keep the miles for another trip. Of course, if you have a family member who doesn’t yet have an Aeroplan account, you could get them to sign up under the current 2500-mile promo for new members and join your family pool (pooling is coming later this year) and maybe they’ll let you use their miles.
Update: It’s worth noting that lap infants either were or perhaps still are temporarily completely free because of some technical reason related to the migration of the reservation system according to View from the Wing. I’m not sure whether or not they have begun charging again yet, but they will eventually and as of November 8th it will be cheaper than it had been before. (H/T: Running with Miles for bringing this to my attention via Twitter).
To add a lap infant, you will need to first make a reservation for an adult ticket(s), then call Aeroplan to add the lap infant to your booking.
Keys to know:
- If your child will turn 2 during the trip, he or she will need a ticket and seat. See this news story about a family whose child turned 2 during the trip, forcing them to pay thousands of dollars at check-in for a walk-up fare (later refunded, but you may not be so lucky). Your best bet is probably to book two separate one-ways rather than chance an issue on the way home.
- The child will sit on your lap. Seems obvious, but I’ve been asked where the child sits. If there is a nearby empty seat, it is possible that the crew will allow you to use it, but I wouldn’t count on it. While some airlines / planes do have bassinets that attach to the wall on bulkhead seats, note that the weight limits on those are usually 20-22lbs.
- If you want a seat for your child, you will need to book a regular award ticket. That will be at the full adult award price. Unfortunately, most business and first class seats can not accommodate a car seat or harness, so if you prefer to get a seat for your child you may be better off booking in economy class or premium economy.
- If you would like to use Aeroplan miles for the infant ticket, they need to come from the same account used to book the (adult) award ticket. For example, if my wife books tickets for the two of us, she will need to use her miles for the infant ticket (if we choose to pay the cash fee instead, I don’t believe there is any restriction as to whose credit card is used). That said, the “new” program launching on November 8th will have family pooling, which should enable anyone in your family pool to redeem miles from that pool.
This is an exciting change for those traveling with little ones. As someone expecting a new lap infant to join my family soon, it means I will likely be redeeming Aeroplan miles when travel returns to normal.
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I am curious if anyone had experience with this recently, is it still $25 for reward bookings?
This no longer seems to be the case. I booked a one-way Air Canada flight using AC miles from London to the US, and they are charging me $144CAD to add a lap infant. And on this page, Air Canada says that the cost is 10% of the ticket:
https://www.aircanada.com/ca/en/aco/home/plan/special-assistance/travelling-with-children.html
That page is for revenue fares. If you bought a cash ticket, you’ll pay 10% of the adult fare.
For an award ticket, the policy is $25 CAD or 2500 miles. See page 3 of Aeroplan’s flight reward policy:
https://www.aircanada.com/content/dam/aircanada/portal/documents/PDF/loyalty/flight-rewards-policy-en.pdf
I wonder if they’ve changed their policies since then. This was for an award ticket in business class, and I booked my lap infant today and got hit with the $144 fee to London and $56 for the flight home. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I very much doubt that it has changed. It’s more likely that you got an agent who didn’t know the proper way to do it and/or was confused with the paid ticket policy. Unfortunately, it is very common for agents to not know how fringe stuff like lap infant awards are supposed to work. I once called Virgin Atlantic to price out a lap infant award 6 times and got 6 different answers about how much it would cost (and I suppose that I would have gotten ticketed at any one of those prices if I’d have taken their answer and paid the price):
https://frequentmiler.com/6-calls-6-different-answers-customer-service-doesnt-always-know-best/
Did you only call once? I’d have definitely hung up and called again and I think it might be worth another call if you want to pay less.
Their lap infant award policy has been widely reported across the Internet and is something their reps explicitly confirmed when the new program launched not even 1 full year ago. It wouldn’t be like Air Canda to secretly change the policy less than a year later, not change the materials on their website (again, the page you pointed to was not for award tickets but rather paid ones — the award ticket policy still clearly says 2500 miles or $25CAD) and just start quietly charging people more for a lap infant award. In fact, during the pandemic, for a long time they weren’t charging at all for a lap infant (they still weren’t as of earlier this year).
Very frustrating if a rep overcharged you, but that’s what it sounds like to me. I’ll check back in with our Aeroplan contact today, but I’m greater than 90% sure that this was a mistake.
[…] you could want to know about the new Aeroplan. A key point that stood out for me was the fact that Aeroplan will now become the hands-down best program for booking a lap infant. See this complete guide for full award charts, shortcuts to elite status, and […]
Any word on what is meant by this comment about lap infants under the new program: “Where applicable, taxes, fees and charges will be assessed and must be paid in cash.”
It means that you may still pay tax / airport facility charges / other government-required stuff when that stuff is applicable. For instance, some countries charge a departure tax for every passenger (which is part of the taxes you ordinarily pay on any award ticket). I don’t know for sure if any of those types of taxes apply specifically to infant lap tickets, but if a country has such a tax and it applies to infants, I assume Air Canada will collect that when you pay for the infant ticket (and they are saying that if such a fee exists, you have to pay that portion in money even if you’re using miles for the infant ticket). All that said, I’m not aware of any such taxes. I expect that line is there because Air Canada doesn’t know when some country is going to add a new tax or fee that is mandatory on all tickets.
In my experience, the times I’ve had to pay 10% of the adult fare, I’ve paid 10% of the full adult fare (including the taxes). The times I’ve used miles, I’ve only paid the miles and no taxes. My assumption here is that it’ll just be $19 in the majority of cases or just 2,500 miles. For what it’s worth, I don’t think that wording is a change from the current policy and the last time I booked a ticket with Aeroplan, the lap infant was the $100 CAD or 10,000 miles that is the current price. No additional fees.
Thanks
Can you confirm that I’m understanding correctly that this applies to any fought booked with Aeroplan miles, even if the flights are operated by a different carrier? Thanks
Yes, that’s correct. All classes of service, all partners. Starts November 8th.