Comments on: Airline keeps $15 luggage fee – even after it loses passenger’s bag

By: nyguy

nyguy — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 18:46:45 +0000

After Delta lost my luggage for 18 hours, I simply reversed the baggage charge through my credit card company. Problem solved. Of course I emailed them first and got the same ‘you pay whether it arrives or not’ reply.

Be sure to never pre-pay the luggage fee so that it is a separate charge, making it quite simple to reverse the charge later if necessary.

By: mitchel d

mitchel d — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 19:33:32 +0000

I was traveling this weekend and in military uniform coming back from tdy and they still insisted that i pay the 20 dollar checked luggage! on military orders! not only did i have to pay the 20 dollars they lost my luggage 2 for 5 hours while i waited around at the airport for it…They wouldn’t refund my money either im hoping some1 will start a class action law suit and make united reinburse its customers when they loose the luggage!

By: Ron in Santa Monica

Ron in Santa Monica — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 01:44:45 +0000

My mother–aged 85–flew from LAX to So. Bend via O’Hare. I checked her in the day before, paid the $12 early check-in fee to United–and thought that was that. (OK: I know United: I was just trying to make her feel better.) The flighte from ORD to SBN ws cancelled and, after 8 hrs in lovely O’Hare, she go home. NO BAG. And by that hour, no rep was there. She called the nexy day and was told that if she wanted the bag in the next three days, she’d have to get it hersel;f. So she drove though the snow the 15 miles back to SBN. Refund? I did say UNITED, did I not? Maybe if I had paid the $15 . . .

By: Taxman

Taxman — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 07:44:28 +0000

I too paid the $15 fee to check in luggage at O’Hare. I flew from O’Hare to Honolulu with a flight change in Los Angeles. The baggage some how in Los Angeles was re-routed to Lihue instead of Honolulu. How in the world that occurred is beyond me!

I am still waiting for my luggage and I paid them $15 to lose my luggage! Needless, if I do not get reimbursed for that fee, I will initiate the class action lawsuit!

By: Brian

Brian — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 08:41:22 +0000

In regards to Ted’s comment from January 18, 2009 that the airlines could monetize a lost bag that needs to be located; no airline could ever do something like that. If airlines think that it’s okay to do so, why not just declare all checked bags lost so that the airline can extract even more money from customers. Of course, doing so, would be their ticket to court, and could put them in very serious trouble because the court would find them abusing the system in the name of profit.

By: MoNgo

MoNgo — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 15:20:09 +0000

I like the part where it costs the airline more than $15 in labor to respond with the poor excuse.
I receive spam on boycotting gas stations on certain day because of prices. Anyone out there think “a day without flying” general strike may have an effect?

By: lily

lily — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 04:23:31 +0000

they’re losing a customer over $15? Whomever told her no needs to be fired and put into a customer service training class. So stupid!

Airlines are going out of business b/c they have no idea what customer service means. They treat their employees like disposable underwear and expect them to treat customers with respect. UGH! I can’t wrap my head around their unwillingness to refund $15 and give you something to compensate for your time/frustration.

United blows

By: Stephen Pickford

Stephen Pickford — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 16:39:57 +0000

Definitely dispute the credit card charge. You did not receive the service paid for, period. In the very least, you waste the time of some feeble bent-over lifer in Accounting having to shuffle papers and explain things to the Bank….and, in the interim, send a “Without Prejudice” letter threatening legal action to their General Counsel. This was, as Chris stated, a breach of contract…and some enterprising attorney might care to entertain a class action suit on a contingency basis.

By: Ted

Ted — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 22:50:58 +0000

I’m surprised that United didn’t charge Ms. Yang a fee for recovering the lost bag. Airlines desperate to stanch their revenue hemorrhages are looking for new and better ways to monetize every aspect of the passenger experience. Since lost baggage is increasingly an integral part of the passenger experience, it’s clearly ripe for monetizing!

After all, airlines incur no small expense in locating mislaid bags, handling repeated irate phone calls from impatient and ungrateful passengers, and finally delivering the bags to the passenger’s location. Any decent person would agree that it is grossly unfair to burden the airline’s beleaguered shareholders with absorbing those expenses. And it would be even more unfair to burden the innocent, hard-working shareholders with the loss of the original fee for the checked bag on top of that expense.

So I think we’d all agree that it’s only fair that the airline should keep the original fee for the checked bag, and also charge passengers a fee sufficient to cover the full costs of returning any bags that, for whatever reason, weren’t delivered to the flight’s carousel.

A lost baggage recovery fee would also benefit passengers by giving them more choice. If they’re unwilling to pay the fees, they can choose to ship their bags through a third-party delivery service (thereby freeing up valuable space in airline cargo holds); or they can choose to travel with only what the TSA and the airlines allow in carry-on bags and then buy whatever else they need at their destination. And if a passenger does decide to check a bag that is subsequently lost, the passenger has the choice of paying the cost of recovering the bag or voluntarily abandoning the bag. So I think we would all agree that a fee for recovering lost bags benefits airlines and passengers alike!

By: Luggage carts | Protocol Luggage

Luggage carts | Protocol Luggage — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:36:48 +0000

[...] United Airlines lost her luggage on a recent flight from Washington to San Francisco. She had paid $15 for the airline to deliver her bags to her at the carousel when she arrived. It didn’t. At the airport, I was told by the baggage … Protocol Luggage [...]

By: Michell

Michell — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:43:34 +0000

Oh, $15 — she got off easy. I got held up for 150 Euros in Bangkok for an extra bag charge — even though i was flying first class and the number of bags checked was clearly included in all documentation. At some point, you realize you will miss your flight if you don’t stop fighting and just pay (I made it with moments to spare flying home for Christmas, so really, no options).

Since KLM collected the charge in Bangkok, but Delta lost the bags in LA (all of them, not just the over limit bag), just try to get that money back.. and I’m a million miler on Delta.

Going forward, I’ll be looking to Fed Ex and other package delivery companies for my luggage.

By: igeva

igeva — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 22:36:46 +0000

I am in the travel business, and in the business of marketing travel.
I’m giving up my Premier status with United, because they have lost my luggage 3 times during 2008.
Don’t think for a minute that if you have an “elite” status you get better service at United, no way.
From now on, I will travel with price based agenda.
The bottom line is simple: there are no airlines in this country who care about customers. We shouldn’t care about them either.
I will not feel sorry for any United employee after that company will vanish.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:18:08 +0000

Maybe she can file a chargeback if she paid by credit card?

By: Vidiot

Vidiot — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:12:35 +0000

And when are those fuel surcharges going away, either? Gas is $1.99/gal in NYC right now, which is way down from where it was only months ago. I don’t see that fee going anywhere. I’d rather they just raised the fare and didn’t keep nickel-and-diming us.