Airline Baggage Policy

This past Friday my daughter flew from Denver to Baltimore to spend her winter break with her mother and father. She brought her cat with her and decided to fly United Airlines because they allow you to bring a small pet in the cabin. She had two pieces of checked baggage and paid $25.00 for the first and $15.00 for the second. Her flight arrived on schedule and all was well until we got to the baggage carousel and discovered one of the bags was missing.

In this age of computerization the missing bag attendant was able to verify that the bag was still in Denver. For some unknown reason it had missed the flight. However, she assured us the bag would be on the flight due in that evening and there was nothing to worry about.

The evening flight arrived at 7pm and when no one called by 9pm we contacted United's missing bag website, which offered no news. We then called the service number and spoke with a person who could only tell us the bag was still in Denver, but we would get it on Saturday.

To make a long story short, after five more calls, we got the bag Sunday evening.

Back in the days when your baggage was included in the price of your ticket, you wearily accepted the fact that these things happened. However, now that we have to pay to have checked baggage, I think the airlines need to have a written policy on their responsibility if they fail to produce the bag you paid to have shipped with you.

I believe the policy should state clearly that they will refund double what you paid to ship the bag. After all, you paid for a service and they failed to deliver. Plus, if they made that commitment in writing, I bet there would be a lot less missing bags.

Share your horror stories about airline trips in recent times.

We, the customer have a right to the service we paid for.

Its Common Sense!