My wife and I fly much less than we used to, but often enough that we know what we're doing. Here's one that came up on a trip we took a couple weeks ago that never happened before...curious if this is more GA/Security Bovine Scat or a legitimate (although rarely enforced) rule:

Wife and I boarding (cant recall which AL...i think either UA or AA). Between the two of us, we had a backpack, standard 22" roller, laptop bag, and small duffel bag(personal carry-on). 2 items per person as allowed (never had an issue in several years with these exact items). Since I was raised this way, I carried all four items for the both of us: backpack on shoulders, laptop hooked to roller, and duffel on top of roller. Walked up to scan BP's with a smile and a greeting (so they hassle the next guy, not me), and while scanning our BP's (with wife right next to me), GA says we can't board unless wife is carrying two of the bags into the jetbridge. ...?...GA said (paraphrasing), if they see us walk down the jetbridge with me carrying the four pieces they'll get fined. I wanted to call BS, but not worth the hassle, and then escalate etc...it was obvious the particular GA wanted to assert her authority.

Is this for real?

As a test, we did the exact same thing for every other segment of our trip (about 8 flights total)...of course it never even got a glance on any other flight after this first GA, and certainly never before on any other flights we have taken thru the years...just silly...

side note: on one of our segments, granny across the aisle knitting with two massive knitting needles. All I could think about was John Wick 2...and how silly it is that those are allowed, but my tiny scissors in my nail/grooming kit got confiscated once (of course, also out of the blue after flying with them for ~ eleventy-hundred segments...).

I don’t believe carry-on allowance is a legal requirement, but it is an airline rule.

No fine involved, unless there’s some sort of intra-airline bonus-holdback or something.

BUT - “it’s illegal”, “we’ll get fined”, etc. are often code for “I don’t want to get in trouble if someone else sees and complains.”

No this is not a rule at all. If you are carrying them for your wife who is clearly right next to you, then you are fine. GA was being overly-paranoid by far.

If it was clear you are traveling by yourself then yes obviously she is right, however if you are right next to your wife like that and she is empty handed, you would be fine.

Think of this scenario, let's say you are traveling by yourself and get scanned with one roller bag and one backpack in compliance. Then on the jet bridge, when the line backs up, you pull a 3rd smaller bag out of your backpack. There is zero way the airline can be liable for that as they would have no way of knowing.

As a former airline worker I assure you that GA was taking a rule and overinterpreting it. Now had you guys had more than the allotted bags and they let you go, if the FAA saw it "technically" they could get fined, but that's extremely unlikely unless it was a habitual habit by the GA who had been talked to before.

Bad understanding of the rules in this thread leads to poor advice.

While the carrier sets the carry-on allowance, it must file that with the FAA. It then becomes an FAA rules violation for the carrier to fail to enforce the allowance it has set.

So, unless you want to play junior lawyer, that is routinely condensed to "it's an FAA violation for which we (I) may be fined....) That is neither a lie nor inappropriate. It's not a court argument but a boarding gate.

If the GA was concerned, it was likely because he had been warned that there was an FAA inspector around. While there is no requirement that each passenger personally handle their own carry-on, having one person head down the jetway with four bags, is a good way ---- if there is an Inspector ---- to have the boarding stopped and the situation dealt with.

If your wife required assistance, it was fair to ask the carrier for that and it would have been obligated to provide that.

Hope this isn't out of place, does a CPAP count as one of the two carry on items?

And that same granny can't carry a circular thread either. However, that same granny could also carry on a 40" long garrote with large metal needles at either end. Just an example as to why TSA is nothing but a show.

No, it does not. Take a look at your carrier's specific list of exemptions from the carry-on rules. Note that all of the major carriers have filed rules, e.g. must enforce, requiring special tagging and that the extra item may only contain the machine and anything else required for the specific flight.

The knitting needle issue above is unrelated to the issue of carry-on abuse and is the typical result ocurring more and more often on FT of perfectly reasonable questions and discussion devolving into extraneous issues having nothing to do with the thread.

Thank you! I could not have said it better:

Please get back on topic, that is Carry-On Allowance.

TWA884
Travel Safety/Security co-moderator

GA on power trip. That's all.

Thank you.

BS and GA on power trip; plain and simple. But probably the right choice to not escalate on-scene if your wife is physically capable of lugging the bag.

I've traveled multiple times with my small child (flying in a paid seat). He is entitled to a full carry-on allowance, but there's no way he's going to carry a 22-inch rollaboard down the jetbridge.