carnarvon

This is what I was suspecting .

Thank you anyhow !

zzrayzz

is it possible to shop at the duty-free shops at Terminal 2 even though my flight departs from terminal 1?

Goldorak

No. But I think you have (more or less) the same shops in T1.

zzrayzz

the girlfriend wants to specifically go to Chanel... I guess I will have to fly out terminal 2 instead

Thorgils

Thank you for this helpful sticky.

Can it really be true (as others have told me in another thread) that, on arriving by a Schengen connection (LH) at Terminal 1 and reclaiming one's checked bags, there is absolutely no place there in the Terminal 1 arrivals hall to check in our bags for our connecting AF flight? Do we really have to schlep our bags with us all the way over to T2F before we can re-check them?

Note that the probability of my getting the bags checked through at origin by LH is likely to be small, it appears.

Goldorak

If your bags are not checked through and you have to collect them in CDG, yes it is true. AF does not operate from T1 and so they have no counters there.
This is not specific to CDG/AF and would be the same in almost all multi-terminal airports, with the notable exception of US airports when arriving from international and connecting to domestic, but that's a special case.

Thorgils

Well, you may be correct in that assertion, but it's certainly not been my own general experience outside the US, particularly at "gateway" airports with large numbers of intercontinental arrivals (e.g., LHR, SYD). Having connecting baggage drop capabilities in all of the major arrival halls seems very much a "no brainer" to me, and particularly so for a "national airline" with the dominant share of connecting traffic to domestic and other nearby destinations.

That neither CDG nor AF management apparently understands this says a lot about their interest in customer service in matters that make a difference to their passengers' experience of the airport. It's pretty "bush league," in my opinion.

stimpy

I think you need a bit more travel experience before you go blaming AF here. As Goldorak said, this is absolutely true all over the world including LHR. In fact it is MUCH worse at LHR. For instance you cannot check your bags for a BA flight that leaves from T1 when you are at the BA counter at T5. You have to transport yourself and your bags to T1.

Moreover this exists in the US as well between airlines. At LAX for example if you arrive on LV but leave out on UA, you have to shlep your bags between terminals either walking or taking a bus.

But note that most people check their bags all the way through rather than trying to pick them up in the middle of the trip.

orbitmic

What cross-terminal luggage check have you experienced at LHR??? As a weekly user of the airport, I cannot think of any.

SYD is the same as US airports and for the same reasons too: compulsory customs clearance at point of international entry (made worse by international arrivals from a separate terminal from domestic) resulting of a specific recheck point after international customs only.

European airports have neither compulsory point of entry customs clearance nor separate international terminal, so as Goldorak rightly says, they do not normally offer cross-terminal check in.

Goldorak

I won't comment for SYD as I've never been there, but for LHR if we consider BA as the dominant carrier, I have never seen a BA bag drop-off counter in the arrival halls of T4 or T2, terminals they don't operate from.

Generally speaking, outside north America, it's pretty rare to have bags drop-off facilities in arrival halls. This is my experience and I have traveled extensively. Of course it doesn't mean that it does not exist (obviously it does) and that it has no interest. But in the case of our discussion (AF @CDG1) :
- CDG is a huge airport
- AF doesn't have any operations at T1
- relatively "few" pax transfer T1 to AF or reverse and I'pretty sure that AF has a connection counter airside at T1 and that's fulfilling the needs of the majority of pax connecting T1 to AF to issue boarding passes.
- and so the cost for AF to have a baggage drop-off counter at T1 will surely not be outweighed by the benefits.
just my opinion and I fully respect yours of course, but I think you are largely overestimating the existence of such facilities in the world.

Thorgils

Possibly . . . I admit it's been well over a decade since I last needed to interline on separate reservations at either LHR or LGW. I'm sorry to hear that the situation at LHR has deteriorated from my memory of it.

I've never interlined on separate tickets at LAX, either, but my memory of IAD, EWR, and JFK (also several years out of date, at this stage) is that there are "any airline" drops for interconnecting baggage immediately after exiting the final customs barrier. Shouldn't that be the expected industry standard of convenience, from the passengers' viewpoint? Admittedly, the growth of airline-specific baggage charges makes it a more challenging goal these days, but certainly not beyond the capability of resolution with IT and high smartphone ownership, I would think.

That's certainly true, and I would love to do that on this trip, but when the LH reservations system doesn't even recognize the existence of NTE let alone sell tickets to there, one is forced into making separate reservations these days!

Goldorak

As we said previously, the US/Canada airports are indeed a global exception. Such facilities were put in place because of the need to clear customs at your 1st entry point in the US and so everybody, without exception, needs to claim bags. In case of connection (which concern a lot of pax in US international gateways), most of the time they are tagged until final destination and so the principle is that you are just putting them on a belt. But they are some exceptions : LAX is one as said by Stimpy. Even within the same alliance by example connecting AF to DL in LAX, you need to carry your bag from TBIT to the DL terminal. JFK is also an exception : in many terminals, you cannot just drop your bags on arrival and you need to carry them to your next terminal.

orbitmic

To be honest, it hasn't - at least in the past 30 years (can't comment beyond that!). There have never been cross-terminal baggage checks at LHR.

LGW has a slightly different system: since it has many low cost airlines which do not accept through checking, the airport itself has created its own baggage recheck system in the arrivals area working with some specific airlines (effectively, the main low costs operating at LGW + VS. By contrast, airlines like BA and major international airlines are not part of the system). It is called Gatwick Connect and is quite recent (started about 3 years ago).

Edlington

Hi everyone!

Can someone please share some advice about connecting at CDG? My parents are flying and they're not very experienced travelers and have a fairly tight connection. I've tried to figure things out through the FAQ and the terminal map but I'm still not sure what would be the best way for them to proceed.

Flights:
BUD-CDG-SFO, 1:45 connection.
SFO-CDG-BUD, 1:15 connection.

All flights AF and on the same booking. It seems it's a Terminal F -> E connection (gates "M" probably). Should they take the shuttle?
They're flying J so will have access to fast lane.

Thanks!

carnarvon

BUD-CDG : Arrival in terminal F.
CDG-SFO: Departure from either K, L or M gates, depending on the type of plane and time (L pier close in thee afternoon).

Tell your parents to check the screens immediately after they exit the glass corridor from F terminal. Depending on the K, L or M letter for their flight to SFO, they only need to follow the signs (2E-K, 2E-L or 2E-M) and walk.

On the way back is easier : arrival in 2E (whichever gate does not matter). They need to follow the signs for connecting flights / terminal 2F.