My large piece of luggage which you can see in the picture at the top of this post has just been on its third holiday without me. Yes, once again it took off on its own and decided to go on tour alone.
Having your baggage delayed or misplaced is quite a disconcerting experience for most people. Inside are valuable items and things you need, so having no bag is a world of stress.
Where Did My Bag Take A Holiday?
Summer storms are a fact of life in the United States. Apparently they are so severe that airports actually close for a period of time while the weather front passes through.
I got caught on a flight from Washington DC to Boston. We pushed back from the gate and then we ended up parking up by the runway for a good part of two hours before we could go.
Naturally this meant I missed my connecting flight and ended up on a different flight with minutes to spare. Of course, the bag didn’t make it to the new flight which I completely expected.
American Airlines, to their credit, got the bag moving fast. They have a great baggage tracking feature on their web site, so I could see my bag decided on a short break in Philadelphia before coming to Dublin.
One Other Fly In The Ointment
While American Airlines had the bag to Dublin less than 24 hours after my own arrival, I didn’t see the bag until three days later. You may wonder why this is so.
The bag arrived at the beginning of a holiday weekend in Dublin and apparently the courier service does not operate except on working days. I had no problem since I was at home, but imagine if I was a tourist visiting the country. I’d be very unhappy about that!
Overall Thoughts
As I said, this is the third time my bag has been on holiday without me. Each time it has come back safely via courier, which actually saves me having to schlep all 20 odd kilograms of it with me on the bus to my house.
Being able to track your bag online via the airline web site is something that all carriers should offer. I am really quite laid back so the delay in getting the bag from Dublin Airport to me was no problem, but in reality they should engage couriers that work weekends.
Have you ever had your bag lost or delayed? How did you feel and what was the outcome? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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I ahd a wonderful experience (not!) with Hawaiian. We flew back from Honolulu to Phoenix overnight and on arriving in the baggage claim area, I was called over by a Hawaiian rep. She informed me that my bag hadn’t made it from HNL. OK, I thought. She promised it would be on the next flight over and would then be delivered to me here in Tucson. It didn’t arrive the next day. Or the next. I then had to fly off to Europe, so needed to replace lots of the things that hadn’t turned up. It actually took five days… Read more »
That’s an awfully long time to wait for a bag, especially when the airline knew it had not loaded the bag and then promised it the next day. I wonder what happened to delay it all that extra time. It is a shame you haven’t heard anything back. Since you had to purchase new items, you should be able to claim for those from Hawaiian as the Montreal Convention of 1999 allows this. As long as you have the receipts for the items you needed to buy for your Europe trip, you should be able to claim all of that… Read more »
[…] Ever had your baggage go on a little holiday without you? – One more reason why I don’t check bags. If I can’t make the flight, I don’t want my suitcase enjoying travel that I can’t. HAHA Really though, you don’t want your luggage to away from you for any extended period of time. Especially if you have anything of value in your suitcase, it may go on a permanent holiday. […]
One more reason why I don’t check bags. If I can’t make the flight, I don’t want my suitcase enjoying travel that I can’t. HAHA Really though, you don’t want your luggage to away from you for any extended period of time. Especially if you have anything of value in your suitcase, it may go on a permanent holiday.
I’m with you, I usually travel with cabin baggage only, unless I am going to Australia or on a long trip and this was a two week one so I needed all the bits such as my suit and so on. I am extremely glad it got back to me as suits aren’t cheap! I don’t mind having the bag couriered to me though, but even so most of my wardrobe was in it so a loss would have been a real pain!!
On my first trip to Europe with my wife, Delta managed to misplace one of my suitcases. The one with all of my clothes. I spent the first five days in Crete wearing the same clothes in August.
Ugh, that sounds terrible! My friend had the same – Finnair lost his bag and he didn’t see it for almost a week. He bought some replacement cheap clothes and claimed on travel insurance but needless to say he won’t be flying Finnair ever again! Thanks for the comment!