sdflyer04

Heading to Hawaii on HA soon and wondering about the mechanics of the free bag for using a Barclays HA MasterCard. Can it be used for advanced online check in? How?

We will have three family members with three different cards. I am hoping they give us 3 free bags.

saacman5033

Note the requirement that you must have purchased the tickets directly from HA using your MasterCard to get the free bag. Were each of the 3 cards used to purchase a separate ticket? In that case should be no problem.

YouGoGlenCoco

If the ticket was purchased with at least one of the cards and each of three are primary (not authorized) cardholders, you should each get the free bag.

But yes - the ticket had to have been purchase directly from HA (.com, airport, or calling Reservations). No OTAs.

sdflyer04

The tickets were all purchased with one HA card (a new one from Barclay). I purchased all of them on one card and then wondered if I'd made a mistake in not using one of the other cards at least. I called and HA assured me that as long as I had separate primary cards for specific passengers that they would get the free bag. So, I am counting on getting two free bags because one of the three cards is only an authorized card. It would be nice to get three bags given that I will have three cards, but I am not counting on that. By the way, how do they know if a card is an authorized card or a primary card?

How is this done? Can I use the cards with on line check in?

Thanks.

YouGoGlenCoco

If at least two cards are primary, you should be getting two free bags and this is available during online check in.

Not sure how they "know" - but I presume they have a way to differentiate primary vs. authorized.

miles_navigator

Please report back how this turned out both on the mainland side on the Hawaii side. I'd like to know before my next trip.

My experience earlier this year: there was nothing in the online check in to waive the fee. I had to stand in line at JFK show the agent the credit card and a print out that I brought from home stating the free bag terms. She was clueless and then asked the guy next to her who knew about it and said it is a new promo. She manually waived the bag fee. I only had 1 bag to check and 1 card.

On the way back at OGG, it was such a zoo that day (HA computer crashed). I got to the airport 3+ hours early and barely made the flight. Re: bags/card I just told the agent about the card and she manually waived the fee. They were just trying to get people through so they wouldn't miss their flights.

sdflyer04

I received 2 free bags both ways. During OLCI, the two holders of the two primary cards had a free bag available. One click and it was done. The holder of the secondary card did not have the free bag available. I really like it. Very simple.

Now, I wonder if I will get the same thing when I fly in November on tickets that I bought using my old HA Visa? I suspect that I will still get it because I think it is linked to my account. But, we'll see.

miles_navigator

This is good news! So if Mrs and I each have our own primary cards I assume we should pay for award tickets on a separate record locator instead of being combined so both credit cards are used to pay and match to the flight or is it smart enough to know you have a primary card so 1 free bag for you regardless of how it's ticketed.

sdflyer04

The two free bags that we received were for tickets bought with one of our primary cards using the 25% off companion fare. So, apparently the tickets don't have to be purchased using separate credit cards.