Whilst on this subject, can I alert you to another Boarding Card code - not important if you're travelling to "ordinary" places, but could be critical if you visit somewhere where theft is rife!!!

If you examine your check-in agent issued boarding pass, you will observe a code that shows how many bags you checked in and the weight declared by the agent. (If you are allowed 23kg but have checked in 35 and the agent "let you off", he/she will probably record 23!!!)

Now cometh the important bit -

In Lagos / Accra / Dar es Salaam / Kingston etc, your bag doesn't turn up. The clerical staff will firstly ask to see your baggage receipts and next your boarding pass stub. If you subsequently checked an extra bag, and a new boarding pass was not issued to show the extra piece, your claim could fail! Similarly, if the correct weight of your baggage wasn't recorded (nowadays, very few destinations require us to annotate weight), and the Warsaw Convention claim limits are invoked, the claims people may only pay compensation on the declared weight!

Now, OLCI and SSCI guys, this presents a problem. British Airways, in their wisdom, have never instructed check in staff to issue a new boarding pass when a passenger comes to the "Fast" (who the hell coined that misnomer?) Baggage Drop desk - indeed, if we did, it would slow down proceedings drastically!

Can the official BA lurker please examine this situation and report back?