

What's on an airline baggage tag? - jgrahamc
http://www.jgc.org/blog/2009/08/whats-on-baggage-tag.html

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mseebach
I'm pretty sure that most luggage is lost when connecting at a busy airport,
and there's some kind of glitch in the baggage handling at the airport. It's
doesn't have to be a system-wide failure, just a single truck-driver running
late, because a loading-team is two down because of the flu, and 100 bags miss
their connections. Naturally, they are given lowest priority (when running
behind, better get as many bags as possible on the right flight in time -
whats it worth moving one bag that's already missed its flight, instead of one
that has a chance of making it).

The bag lie around until evening when the pace slows down, and the remaining
bags are routed to the relevant flight. But it might be a while until a
there's flight in the relevant direction, and there might not be enough room
on it.

At the destination airport, the bag waits around for a courier pickup, and
that might take a while, because the airline wants to get as many bags as
possible on the same pickup, because it's cheaper/easier.

I may be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure: At NO point during this process
doesn't the airline know exactly where the bag is. Barcodes are not at fault
here, RFID won't fix it -- the problem is overloaded systems, delayed flights
and overly optimistic connection-times are.

They don't tell you this, because it's simply easier not to. If they telling
you one thing, they'll soon end up rationalizing every single decision they
take regarding every bag to everybody. It sucks but the alternative sucks
more.

Upgrading baggage handling is expensive, and there are only the carriers,
which in turn means the passagers, to pay for that.

~~~
cperciva
_overly optimistic connection-times_

Indeed. In almost all cases, it takes longer for a bag to move between planes
than it does for a human to move between planes.

Or, for that matter, to get back onto the same plane. A couple of years ago, I
was flying from Montreal to Vancouver, via Edmonton, with only 30 minutes
scheduled to get between flights. It turned out that the same plane was being
used for both the Montreal-Edmonton and the Edmonton-Vancouver flights; I made
the connection, but my suitcase didn't -- it was taken off the plane along
with all the others, went into the airport's baggage routing system, and
didn't make it through in time to get back onto the plane.

~~~
Hexstream
"It turned out that the same plane was being used for both the Montreal-
Edmonton and the Edmonton-Vancouver flights; I made the connection, but my
suitcase didn't -- it was taken off the plane along with all the others, went
into the airport's baggage routing system, and didn't make it through in time
to get back onto the plane."

I can understand why they wouldn't bother optimizing such a rare special case.
There are probably a long chain of procedures that would have to be made more
complex to accomodate this.

Yet another case of choosing general scalability over local performance ;)

------
yardie
"At this point I realized why people get paid at newspapers: it takes time and
money to investigate things."

Umm yeah! I never understood how people get all up in arms when newspapers
have decided relying in advertising isn't going to pay for good, local,
investigative journalism. Personally, I have lost interest in most local
papers because I can get the national, international stories from other
places, including the source of the story. I keep paying for a copy of the
Economist because every edition is worth it.

------
prakash
From what I have heard, sometimes it's profitable for airlines to offload your
luggage in-favor of some cargo item, since the person sending that cargo is
paying more than you are or is a large customer or that cargo has to be
somewhere within 24 hours.

This way, the airlines make money. Even inn cases they have to pay out a per-
day amount/ compensate you for lost luggage -- they come out ahead on the
money they make via sending someone else's cargo.

~~~
jonsen
I've seen it. From the gate waiting for boarding I saw cargo loaded in the
plane. Later they announced that not all luggage 'could' be accommodated
aboard and was to follow on the next plane.

------
DougWebb
I was once waiting for my flight and watching the activity out on the tarmac.
A luggage cart dropped someone's suitcase, and it sat out there for at least
an hour while the carts drove back and forth around it. Eventually, someone
picked it up, but I'm sure the owner was long gone. Technically, I guess that
doesn't count as "lost", but I wouldn't say that they set it aside until they
had time to handle it.

~~~
jonsen
I had almost same experience in Copenhagen Airport. Had to leave after half an
hour and the suitcase was not picked up by passing trucks yet.

Edit: Now I remember; one cart-driver did stop, picked up the suitcase, placed
it outside of the driveway, and moved on.

------
zandorg
On a trip to Thailand in 2003 with friends, in Bangkok, my baggage was lost
but after 4 hours or so, it turned up and I went to collect it.

