Originally Posted by
rossmacd
The best way (if AA refuse to short check) is to head to flight connections desk in T5. At this desk, tell the agent you are not travelling further and you wish to retrieve your bag. You do not need to give a reason/excuse. The bag will be auto-offloaded from your IST flight whilst in the bowels of the T5 baggage system. Head through the border as normal. It will pop out on Belt 8, eventually, in the baggage collection hall. This can take anywhere from 20-60 minutes in my experience. When waiting in the baggage hall, you can ask the agents at the baggage service desk to help speed things along.
This is essentially correct, but with 3 provisos.
- the SLA for this is 3 hours, and it sometimes does take that long, particularly if there are irrops elsewhere
- If this was Terminal 3 or 4, the process is manual and won't be easy, it may take days to be sorted. T2 is automated like T5.
- there is a risk that the bag has been already sent out for the onward flight, depending on where in the airport it is. If the passenger is still booked for flying, it won't be returned if the passenger boards. If the passenger is not flying, or offloads themselves, then the bag will only go back to Belt 8 after loading is completed, the driver has returned to base, had a cuppa etc.
Therefore in this precise scenario, unless the items in the bag are of immaterial value, if AA enforce through checking I would advise the OP to get an e-visa in the lounge and go through the process landside unless the bag is able to surface in baggage reclaim (which is after the UK Border) in T5. In which case they throw away the visa and can stay airside. Personally I would not recommend this course of action, you best go HBO.
Don't worry about the so-called "incure" message, a perusal of BA FT will show this first appeared 3 years ago, and effectively relates to adding bags over your allowance in the wrong place. Either way it is not a material factor in this issue.