A few years ago, I left a tie in a hotel room in Delhi. I called the hotel, and they delivered the tie to a local colleague of mine, who brought it to NY on a subsequent visit, along with a very few items of plastic cutlery that I had left in the room as trash.

More recently, I left a camera in a seatback pocket on a JetBlue flight at EWR. I realized that I had left it after I left the airport. I went back to the check-in desk, the flight had already boarded and was about to leave, but she was able to call the gate, have someone check and then went herself through security to retrieve it for me from the gate agent. Very similar situation with a Kindle in CLT, this time, AA found it, gave it to the gate agent and gave me a gate pass (with TSA Pre-Check!) to get it back.

True, sometimes items of personal value genuinely get lost and those with intrinsic value may get stolen from where they were left, but my experiences have been, by and large, positive.