I've already said I always fly in the day before a cruise. What I was saying was that while many people were beating him up about NOT doing that, I was just pointing out that his bags were lost for 4 days - if he had flown out a day earlier, they would have been lost for 3 (or maybe not, to be sure, but who of us has a crystal ball to say they would NOT have been lost the day before, but WERE lost the day of his cruise?).

I dont think people who point out he should fly in a day earlier for the cruise, mean that if he flied in a day earlier, his bags would arrive on time.

NO. What people are saying is, if you fly in a day earlier, then you have give yourself enough time to handle CONTINGENCIES, including the unlucky event of missing luggages. He could have enough time to get some necessary clothings, his wife could get cosmetics etc etc, before they board the ship, and then could still enjoy their vacation - certainly would be less stressful than they had experienced.

Maybe not, but they should. What did the OP ask for - advice. Telling him to send them directly to the ship is extremely helpful advice. I do it all the time. Usually six times a year. By doing so I never have the problem the OP is reporting since the shipping company is responsible for getting them sent to where I want them to go. Then if they do go astray it is their problem to find them, and deliver them to me.

Lost Bag for Me = Quick stop to the ship store for some t-shirts, shorts and a pair of khakis.

Lost Bag for my GF = cruise is ruined, especially if it is her shoes, hair products and make-up :D

Flying in a day early definitely gives you time to deal with the "what ifs", no one is questioning that.

But it's also true that AA should not be held responsible for the specific situation when they have a general policy for lost bags.

The policy means that the passenger could be heading to a cruise, to a convention hotel, or to his parent's house where he has a full closet of old clothes. When AA loses baggage, they have a specific response on finding it, prepaying for replacement, etc...

Whether the passenger is at a location where clothes and toiletries are cheap or expensive doesn't change that reponse/obligation, any more than the average cost of hotels matter when it comes to giving hotel vouchers for overnight delays which are AA's fault.

There's a lot of good advice on how to minimize risks in the future, but I don't think it's reasonable to claim greater compensation is due because the potential/actual expenses were higher since the passenger had a whole family's worth of clothes packed into 2 bags while embarking on a cruise ship.

If the baggage had been evenly divided into 6 different bags which got checked, the passenger would likely have received more compensation. But since it's 2 bags checked in by 1 passenger, the compensation will be limited.

Forget about luggage: if I ever take a cruise, I'm flying in the day before simply because of normal flight operations. A simple thunderstorm moving through DFW could have caused you to completely miss the cruise. Anyway, dead horse...I know...

That said, I think a $500 reimbursement for 6 people on a cruise when the bags were lost for 4 days is very reasonable. I don't think the OP abused the notion that he'd get reimbursed to spend excessively. If AA was professional, efficient, and accurate in their phone conservations with me, I'd probably settle for that an walk away. If they weren't, I gotta admit: I'd be a little testier. I don't begrudge the airline for losing the bag, but how quick, proactive, and solutions-oriented the client service is after the bags are lost is entirely within their control.

In my experience, AA has been fair when they've lost my bags. It's happened three times over the years, and I've always done my necessary shopping at midscale type places. They've paid the receipts without question, but I don't recall breaking the $250 mark if that's some sort of magic number over which it becomes a "case". My situations were simpler: no cruise, got the bag the next day...

Has anyone on this forum not had bags delayed or lost by the airline?
More likely delayed for a few days?
Yet how many of you have had packages lost by fedex?
Clearly AA could improve the service--they lose and delay an inordinate amount?
If fedex ran their business like AA no one would use them.
But with airlines there is no reasonable alternative.

Quite true. For package shipping- that's all that matters. If they can't do it,use someone else. For airlines,there are so many other factors, so it's harder to use this one factor as a means of decision.

In our case, we've had problems with BA, but never with AA (although we don't check much). For getting into Europe on OW, we don't have a whole lot of choice, though.

I don't have statistics on hand to know if AA or BA are any better or worse than anyone else, so I can't comment on that part. Maybe someone with real data will chime in.

Cheers.

There is a vast difference between FedEx operation and AA operation. FedEx is in a logistic business and 100% geared to that. May be comparing AA's Cargo side of business to the FedEx business, would make a lot more sense, but compare AA's passenger side of business to FedEx, is like the proverbial saying, Apple to Orange.

Do you realize FedEx ships all packages to its Hub in Memphis first regardless where it originated and where it is supposedly to go? Then it sorts the packages at the Hub, and re-distribute them to regional depots. There are 8000 employees working at the Memphis super hub during the day and 4000 during the night.

Would you think a passenger airliner can do that?

Knock on wood for us, we have not had any loss luggage experiences despite we have checked our rollaboards 100% of time in past 24 months on 6 domestic trips, 2 European trips, 2 Australia/New Zealand trips and 2 Asia trips. Airlines involved: AA BA QF CX JL CO & UA. They all arrived with the same flight. The only difference we noticed, was at some airports the Priority tags were observed regardless the check-in time, at some airports the Priority tags mean nothing. Now I mention our luck, I may have just jinxed it!

We could have carry them on the flights but we were lazy and preferred to just take the personal items with us.

The one single time we had our luggage arrived late was on a Hawaii trip - UA failed to unload the bag to transfer to an Aloha flight - none was transferred to Aloha according to the guy at Aloha's desk at Maui. The UA desk said the bag was definitely on the UA flight ORD-HNL but since Aloha was our last carrier - it became Aloha's responsibility to check it down. The bag arrived in a later flight.

I have had packages delayed by FedEX, DHL, USPS, UPS, etc
I have had actually only had one problem with baggage and the bag arrived before I did. I flew SVO-LHR on BA, then LHR-JFK-SFO on AA. My bag was not at JFK when I cleared Immigration. AA claimed the baggage numbered match someone's else bag bound for another location. I got to SFO and went to the AA baggage person there. I even asked if BA might have sent it directly to SFO. He said no. Well, one call to BA quickly found the bag. The bag went directly from LHR-SFO, and was there before I was.

The only other problem in my immediate family was on a family trip to GCM last year. My wife's bag missed the connection, and was delivered to our condo after arriving on a later flight.

So, long story short, even package services have delays. Luggage delays are usually more quickly resolved than the OP's issue, often on the next plane, if it didn't arrive earlier. ;)

I understand where you are coming from. My feeling is that AA has an obligation to get their luggage to them and, if not, make them whole on necessary replacements. My feeling is that we are going to agree to disagree on this one.

Meanwhile, I'd be interested if the OP posts the eventual outcome.

Mike

And if AA priced checked baggage fees like FedEx prices shipping, there would be an uproar! People complain enough about paying the current rates... if AA spent the money to run their operation like FedEx, we'd never hear the end of it. For reference, overnight cross-country shipping of a 40 pound carry-on sized roll-aboard runs about $200, and that's not even same day, which airline baggage service (generally!) is.

Good point!

Or else FedEx would do a roaring business doing airport shipping.....

Wanted to give everybody an update on my situation as a future reference point.

I wrote 2 letters, first one to Central Baggage Service and included all the receipts from the actual expenses I incurred during cruise. The receipts added up to approx. $500 for which I received a full reimbursement.

I wrote a second letter to Customer Relations about the harship we all experienced and within days they wrote back that they will credit 7500 miles to each family member for a total of 45000 miles.

Good ending and I am satisfied with the outcome. The only thing I would have wanted different is if they credited all 45K in 1 AAdvantage account. 7500 miles spread across various accounts makes it harder to use them effectively.