JohnnyColombia

Hi folks

I am transiting SIN tomorrow night, arriving from SYD on BA and leaving to PEK on CA.

Do I need to "enter" Singapore and go to the CA desks landside to check my luggage back in or is there some sort of transfer desk where I can check it back into CA and head off to the lounge?

My bookings are completely different tickets, PNRs, airlines, alliances

Thanks

asiadxer

Since both BA and CA use Terminal 1, your transit should be easy. Just go to the Terminal 1 Transfer Desk C or D at the end of the gates pier by the main hall. They will issue your new CA boarding pass. Show your baggage tags, and they will transfer the baggage to departing flight. Then head to the lounge.

JohnnyColombia

Thanks asiadxer, does the above depend on my asking BA to check my bags through to PEK or can I get new luggage tags at the transfer desk?

Sorry I didn't understand the bit about showing my baggage tags.

YuropFlyer

It will be easier if it's checked-through and you merely want to confirm it's all good, but even if it's not checked-through, the transfer desk can arrange for your luggage to be picked up and transferred onto the CA flight (obviously, some chance for something going wrong exists, but given it's SIN, my experience is that it should work)

How much time do you have in SIN? Ever experienced it before? Even if you just have 4 hours (I assume you've some spare time as it's different PNRs) or so it would be enough for a quick city trip.. better than staying in the lounges for a long time. The SilverKris lounge (when flying in C) is a good choice, though, but if you're in Economy with *G, the offers in the lounges are rather minuscule.

JohnnyColombia

I'm flying C so can I go to the Krisflyer lounge? I went to the Skyview lounge on the way down, it had an Air China sign but it was a bit sucky.

I have about 4 hours there but it's like 9pm to 1am so I'm not fussed about a city tour but thanks, nice idea. I was just there for 4 days over the weekend.

Four hours plenty to just go get the case myself and check it back in? Rather than chance someone from CA having to go get it?

YuropFlyer

Yes, any Star Alliance flight in C will get you into the SilverKris lounge. They're nice, have showers and plenty of food. I strongly suggest the one in T3.

4 hours would mean CA checkin isn't open yet when you arrive (should open 3 hours before departure). Not a problem, as you arrive airside too. Chances are good that BA will let you check-through your luggage in Australia, then I'd just head for the transit desk in T1 to double-check that it will be loaded. If that goes fine, head straight to T3 for the Silverkris, and about 1 hour before departure back to T1.

If they aren't allowing check-through you still get either the choice of trusting the transit desk to organize your luggage transfer fine (very good chance it will go all well!) or if you don't trust them (or really, really need your luggage in PEK on arrival and try to minimize any problems), then my suggestion would be to "kill" around 30min airside till it's not much more than 3 hours before departure (in the not so great lounge in T1) then head towards immigration, pick your luggage (either from the belt still, or maybe from "lost luggage" next to it) and then go towards CA checkin to place your luggage with them immediately afterwards. Then, head to T3 and enjoy the Silverkris lounge.

JohnnyColombia

Thanks a lot Yuropflyer

That sounds like a perfect plan

Guy Betsy

BA will NOT transfer your bags to CA if you're on separate tickets. BA will only check thru bags if they're on to another Oneworld flight (even on separate tickets). If you have one ticket, BA will then thru check you on CA. But you're not...

So you will need to go through immigration and collect your bags, and clear customs in Singapore. Then go to check in at CA desks.


Contrary to what others have said, from personal experience, when you're at the SKL at T3, there is no boarding announcement for CA flights. And where the location of where the SKL is (near gates A8) it is rather far from the transit train at T3 (11 mins walk) to T1 and you'd have to walk a bit more especially if your flight is departing from D gates.

http://www.changiairport.com/en/maps.html

JohnnyColombia

So far so good, I think

BA check in was very helpful and tagged the bags through to PEK, but also insisted on checking my visa status so I had to show them my flight from PEK to KUL to show I was within TWOV limits. Phone calls were made and even the KUL flight was entered into the system.

Hopefully now I only have to go to the transit desk at SIN and get my next boarding pass. Handy because my connection is a whisker under 3 hours and not the 4 hours that I thought I had

Cheers for the helpful advice

Guy Betsy

I'm surprised that BA in SYD did that. Cos it is a well known fact that they don't...

Oh well. Good on ya.

MSPeconomist

OP is apparently arriving and departing from T1. There's no KrisFlyere lounge there, only in T2 and T3. Also OP is arriving on BA (oneworld), so and *A lounge access would be based on the business class departure on CA (=Air China, the mainland Chinese carrier in *A). In T1, IIRC there's a TG lounge, but it's small, dark, and windowless. I'm not aware of other choices. [SkyView, which is the contract lounge for a number of SkyTeam partners, is decent and much better than the TG lounge.]

JohnnyColombia

You have to take into consideration that I am exceptionally charming

Just kidding, but sorry, I did not see your message from last night, I replied without refreshing the browser.

The desk agent this morning was not dismissive and she even had to call her supervisor to make sure she had done everything right. The supervisor did not say "Hey how many times do I have to tell you we do not do that?"

So I saw the luggage tag through to PEK, time will tell whether it arrives with me tomorrow morning or not.

YuropFlyer

Did you even read my posting?

Or did you meant to answer to someone else? Because your "answer" does make zero sense in this context.

JohnnyColombia

All said and done all went very smoothly so thanks for the advice. The transfer desk took a good 30 minutes, problem mainly that he couldn't add up the number of hours I am here in Beijing (<72) and then I showed him my outbound res in myflightsapp. Then the supervisor wanted to check the ticket number himself.

They gave me an invite to SATS Gateway Premier Lounge which was a great lounge compared to the two other contract lounges I tried earlier in the week. I was running out of time given the dithering.

Beijing immigration was not inefficient. Then as if by magic, there was my luggage on the belt. Given two days ago I thought I'd have to go back into Singapore, collect bags then recheck, I'm most grateful for the advice. Smoothish it was

THO

Hi all,

I've got the same questions as JohnnyColombia: In January I'll be transiting at Changi from MH to BA. The flights are on different tickets/PNRs.

As both airlines are Oneworld members, I assume I should be able to check the bags in KUL all the way home. But what will the transit the transit be like in SIN? Will I need to go landside as there is a terminal change?

Thanks,
THO