deac83

Mrs deac83 returned from LHR last night. She had to gate check her carry on. When she arrived the two normally check bags showed up.

An hour passed the gate bag had not shown up. There were 22 other people in same situation. Eventually the AA rep said they found out the bags were sent to another terminal.

After another hour of waiting the agents insisted they had to wait for the bags or the would be thrown out.

Just after 2 hrs of waiting they finally delivered the bags.

I know domestically you can just file a lost bag claim, from personal experience.

The AA agent would not let them leave customs.

if AA actually loses your bag on an international trip I assume you’d have to claim it at customs once the get the bag.

Am I missing something here? They were basically being held hostage by AA. Something seems wrong here.

notquiteaff

That’s not the process. Airlines have to deal with delayed/temporarily lost bags all the time. There isn’t‘ a secret room with cots in the customs area where passengers with delayed bags are held until the bags arrive on the next flight. Airlines have to take them through customs for the affected customers.

Did your wife have a connecting flight after arrival? Did she make that flight despite the delay?

I think the agent was just too lazy to deal with the bags. It’s obviously easier for them to have the passengers take them through customers instead to have the airline do that and then later deliver it to the passenger at home.

I would have been tempted to find a customs officer and ask them “my bag is delayed, is it right that this AA agent can force me to stay here under the thread if otherwise throwing out my bag?”

I hope you have the name of the AA agent. I would file a DOT complaint.

deac83

AA agents had them waiting in a separate room. And kept telling them if they leave they would throw the bags out.

have names and screenshot documenting the time delay on bags.

fortunately we live locally others were connecting. I was waiting in parking and told her they couldn’t do this, but after a 10 hour flight she was not at her best for dealing with this.

as I’ve said domestically they have an hour to deliver bags after that you can file a lost bag claim. Which I know as they had one of mine unloaded at dfw but they couldn’t find it. They got it to me at 55 min.

I don’t know what the time for filing a claim on an international flight is. It could be the same.