SKY PRIORITY - Baggage
 

Hi Everyone,

Well, due to a rapidly deteriorating abcessed tooth and the military's inability to get it taken care of quickly since I work with them as a civilian, I made a last minute booking LHR-ATL-DTW-LHR over this past weekend so I could go to my dentist of many years in ATL. I booked my ticket in BusinessElite on Thursday with 200K miles...there were 150K out there, but the 200K was the routing (lay flat seats) I wanted.

Anyhow, I deplane in ATL, get admitted into the US fairly quickly and head down to the carousel to wait for my two checked bags, a small suitcase and a cricket bat neatly boxed. Bags start to come off and many, many bags had come off the belt before any priority-tagged bags came out for any pax. Not feeling great, and having had priorty bags come out fairly quickly elsewhere in places that were not a DL hub, I was not pleased...eventually the yellow-tagged bags appeared, mixed in with regularly checked bags.

My suitcase comes out, only to have the cricket bat be the very last item...needless to say, I was irritated, as I just wanted to get home and relax before crazy dentist-time on Monday. The DL agent recommended I call SMS...my point being, why bother with tags or anything if they are going to come out last...I felt, in ATL of all places, this should not happen to myself or others with priority baggage.

Anyhow, I did call SMS, they immediately addressed the baggage issue, along with the fact the IFE was really messed up on my flight (some previous dummy that used the seat cracked the screen, really messing up the calibration and ability to use the IFE...I had let the FA know so they could address it) offering miles or travel credit for a future trip. I took the $50 for the inconvenience, as I'll be booking other trips in the near future.

I just figured I'd throw this experience out there. I do not often complain about the things that happen, including baggage, but I figured, partly thanks to others' posts on FT, that DL does not know there's a problem at times if we're not voicing them.

cheers,
robin :)

I have the opposite experience, both internationally and domestically, my bags are usually among the first to come on the belt, which is a pleasant change from past experience. So, as far as I am concerned, DL really has tried to educate their stations in conjunction with the Skypriority campaign.

Obviously, there can be misses which may have to do with the loading abroad, but I for one have seen a great improvement.

My personal experience lately is that since SkyPriority started, there has been an extra effort in baggage service - EXCEPT in ATL. I flew into PIT on the non-stop from CDG and before SkyPriority, you'd wait up to an hour after customs to reclaim your bags. When I came thru recently, my bag was #1 down in 5 minutes! Other times & airports too! VERY fast - except when I came into ATL from South America a few weeks ago. Yellow tagged bags DID NOT come out first. My bags weren't at the very end like yours, but perhaps the ATL baggage crew needs a little extra help - or training.

$50 for the IFE is NOT what you should have been given. $200 in BE on TATL flights is the minimum. Send an email via Delta.com

+1 on the ATL baggage crew. Flew into ATL from Cancun two weeks ago on a flight with a very light SkyPriority load (heck, I got my no status wife op-uped with me on a T fare), and my bags came out near the end. You would think that international arrivals in ATL would be the shining beacon of how it's done. :rolleyes:

Wow, that "no-status wife" line really makes me sound jaded.

after my last trip i wanted to write in about how awesome the new priority tags were working...glad i waited until my return flight and i sent in a complaint instead....

in PHL I had my bag within 15 minutes of deplaning.....in SAT....no bags came out until 30 min after we got to the gate....the priority bags came and went.....my bag was the 3rd from last out and still had the priority tag on it....took 43 minutes to get my bag....I sent a note to Delta and of course I got the canned response of "we are sorry, thank you for telling us"

Similar experience on the 767 to HNL yesterday...about 2 hours out of SLC, the IFE went down, with the exception of the pay per view movies. Then to add insult to injury, all 5 of my checked bags with the SkyPriority tags still on them were literally the last 5 bags to come out at baggage claim. Not the end of the world since my wife was on a flight getting in an hour after me, but I fly enough to earn that SkyPriority benefit and expect it to work the way it is intended.

Generally, we have been impressed by the early arrival of our priority labeled bags. A recent exception, SLC-DTW, one bag each, we were seated in 2C and 2D. Upon arrival at the gate in DTW there was a delay waiting for the jetway operator. Within 1-2 minutes we noticed our 2 bags and only our bags on the tarmac just opposite our seats. Later at the baggage claim, one of our bags came out with the first two or three bags, the other arrived near last. Strange

I've noticed an improvement, at least they're making an effort.

I have noticed a huge improvement. My bag is consistently one of the first off.

Priority bags come out first
 

+1 The last couple of times I had the tag, the bag came earlier than the non priority bags. Domestic though. Perhaps it's different for INTL and for ATL.

LAX-SYD-LAX in late April: Hundreds of bags came off in both SYD and LAX before my priority tagged one. It was a "SkyPriority" disaster. Silver Elites on CO get better service than this on CO.

Isn't it sad that they can't pull this off in their flagship hub? All the more reason to turn ATL back into agri land or a parking lot and move the flagship hub to CVG, where better service is almost guaranteed.

I've been pleased, had bags out first or among the first probably a half-dozen times domestically. Returned to the US Monday flying BIQ-LYS-AMS-SEA and they came out in the middle, but of course I'd checked in on AF in BIQ, no happy little Priority tags there. . .

This past Friday (LGW-ATL) my bag came out fairly quickly...but customs was not too insane..yet... This past Tuesday (ATL-LHR), I waited almost an hour....was not happy about that! This is rare at LHR, as my bags almost always come out quickly from DL, AF, or KL flights.