Swiss International Airlines - Connecting to Swiss from Thai with through checked bags?

I need to travel to Barcelona. Ticketing is a Thai Business class Ticket AKL-BKK-ZRH with a return MUC-BKK-:confused:AKL and a Swiss airways economy ticket ZRH-BCN and BCN-MUC. Both are Star alliance.

The agent says a single ticket can't be issued and it won't be possible to check bags in AKL-BCN and BCN-AKL.

It seems an absurdity to have to run around through customs and security checking in bags at transit stops.

Can this be right, do I need a new agent or a new airline alliance?

Any advice appreciated? Ticketing is due tomorrow.

Ask T/A to issue 2 tickets from a single PNR (segment select ticketing).

TG DCS (Departure Control System = check-in system) wouldn't care then if you have 2 or 1 ticket - they will at least be able to check the baggage through to BCN (and hopefully even print a BP for your ZRH-BKK flight). Otherwise a check-in agent will have to manually add the ZRH-BCN flight to the check-in record in the DCS - most likely it will work out of AKL, might not work (but normally works) out of BCN.

PS. *A is quite good with through check-in. oneWorld is much worse - normally they do not check the baggage through for multi-ticket itineraries.

If you find a good check-in agent, he/she will be able to check your baggage through to BCN and back.

In any case with two tickets it remains your personal risk and not the airlines to cover the risk of a delay of one of your flights into ZRH and missing the connecting flight.

Even with two separate tickets, there is normally no problem with interlining between TG and LX flights.

Checking your bags all the way should work... the agent should know this. Interlining is not exclusive for airlines within an alliance, lots of other airline combinations have also signed these agreements.

But why make a problem out of this now.... just request that at check-in and you should be fine. At least when you have included the legal transfer time between your tickets. And if they for some reason won't do it, there's no real problem. ZRH is an easy airport and takes only a short time to check-in again.

Combining the two tickets is something completely different.... you're taking a risk with splitting your trip in two tickets yourself. Swiss won't be responsible when somehow you can't make your connection.