I have been an AMA member for over 10 years. I live in Canmore and have relied on AMA services many…read moretimes in the Canmore and Banff areas. What happened yesterday represents a clear breakdown of service and communication.
Yesterday, my vehicle broke down and would not start while I was approximately 90 km from my home in Canmore, in Cochrane, in the Bow Ridge neighbourhood. I contacted AMA at 1:00 pm to request roadside assistance. I required a tow truck and transportation home. I was given an estimated arrival time of 6:46 pm, meaning an estimated waiting time of approximately six hours.
I understand that there may be other emergencies that require priority assistance. I was prepared to wait. However, after waiting more than six hours, the way my situation was handled was unacceptable.
The vehicle was stranded in Bow Ridge, an area with no nearby warm places to wait. The closest warm location was approximately 3 km away on foot, which was not a realistic option in winter conditions. For that reason, I had to take a taxi to downtown Cochrane to wait somewhere warm. Each taxi trip costs $18.
At 6:00 pm, I called AMA specifically to confirm whether assistance would actually arrive at the scheduled time, because at that moment the service had not yet been assigned to any provider, which I found concerning. During this call, the representative did not place me on hold or attempt to confirm availability with the service provider. Instead, she simply checked the app, which still showed an arrival time of 6:46 pm, and told me that assistance would be there at the time shown in the app. Based solely on that information, and while I was still in a warm location, I returned to my vehicle and paid another $18 taxi fare.
The tow truck never arrived at the confirmed time, and until that moment, the service had not been assigned to anyone. I was also never contacted to inform me of any delay.
At 7:10 pm, I called AMA again and clearly explained my situation. I made it very clear how frustrated and angry I was with the service and the information I had been given. I explained that I had returned to my vehicle because AMA had confirmed the arrival time, that I was now sitting in my car in winter conditions, without heat, with no warm places nearby, and 90 km from home. The response I received was dismissive: I was told to find another ride to a warm place, meaning yet another $18 taxi fare, and that I would have to wait another hour just to receive an update. No effort was made to locate assistance or improve the situation.
Based on my previous experiences with AMA, whenever I had called for assistance before, I had been sent to Standish Towing & Recovery. For that reason, and given the lack of action from AMA, I decided to call Standish directly to confirm if they were available and if they could assist me. They immediately confirmed that they had a tow truck in Cochrane at that moment. AMA had never communicated with Standish, and I do not know what assistance they were planning to send. After Standish contacted AMA for authorization, a tow truck arrived within 10 minutes.
I also want to emphasize that there were services available to help me. After waiting more than six hours and explaining my situation in detail, it is inexcusable that AMA made no effort to seek an alternative provider or solution. This demonstrates a complete lack of urgency and responsibility.
This leads to an obvious question: Why, after waiting more than six hours and clearly explaining my situation, was no action taken to locate available assistance when I was able to secure help in 10 minutes with a single phone call?
This experience shows poor communication, lack of follow-through, and a failure to act, despite clear information being provided multiple times.
As a result of this experience, I am extremely dissatisfied and will not be renewing my AMA membership. I no longer have confidence in a service that relies on an app rather than verifying availability, confirms an arrival time without confirmation, and then leaves a long-term member without assistance.
