Luggage Privileges with Emerald?
 

I am Diamond (emerald) on CX and will be flying economy to Europe. One leg will be flying ZRH-LHR. Last time I did this flight I was sapphire and had to repack two bags into one at the check-in to avoid excess charges. With the higher tier do you get any luggage privileges on BA or should I just try and pack one bag?

No luggage benefits at all - very disappointing since Star is fairly generous for their status passengers across all member airlines.

I have found as OW Emerald, check-in agents are more likely to look the other way if I am over the baggage limit. I usually travel with 1 20kg and 1 10-15kg bag on Y tickets, and I would say that on non-AA OW flights I am only hit for the excess baggage fee ~30% of the time. However, it is not a published benefit and they can and do charge the excess.

I assume you entire itinerary is in Economy.

You'll probably need to rely on luck unless your fare basis permits additional checked baggage.

e.g. LONEx's and other oneworld products allow a minimum of 2 x 23 Kg of checked luggage per passenger for any segment.

BA have a (I think unpublished) benefit for their own Elite FFs that hold luggage can go up to 32kg, but this does NOT apply to other OW frequent flyers as discussed here at post 2. That poster is a BA employee and knows her stuff, so please don't take it out on her.

It's one piece in economy. You can pay extra during online checkin to boost the weight to 32kg; you may be lucky at the airport and not have to.

That's life - it is economy, after all (and I write as a some time economy flyer).

Actually it is a published benefit, see:
http://www.britishairways.com/travel...searchResults#
http://www.britishairways.com/travel...=searchResults

Equally QF provides extra allowances to its own elites (both weight and piece)
http://www.qantas.com.au/travel/airl...gage/global/en

but again no benefit to other oneworld elites

I'm OW Emerald and usually fly F with one verrry heavy bag, way over the limit. Never had an excess charge. Obviously, though, can't tell if it's because of cabin flown or OW status.

Pretty sure not because of your status.

F has a checked luggage limit of 40kg (88lbs) on flights that don't include the Americas. Unless you're packing bricks in your bag you should be under the limit, especially since it's only one bag.

Under that limit, though not by much. Most of my flights have one end in the USA.

What are you carrying that is so heavy?

With the exception of presentational equipment (which is always more comfortable to send by courier), I can never work out why people take the kitchen sink with them.

Interesting question, and I've thought about it before, too. I'm not actually sure. My trips are usually a bit under three weeks in length, so it's really just lots of clothes, some footwear. I hate doing laundry on trips. And I'm always a little nutty about making sure that I have at least a little of everything. Next trip (mid-January) I'm going to try doing it with less. I never wear even close to all that I take.

I can easily max out a piece system allowance with *G benefits. No problems at all.

What are you thinking, that this is Star alliance?

No obligation on oneworld members to extend all benefits given to their elites to other oneworld elites, nor any coordinated baggage allowance for elites.

Makes the alliance pretty weak IMHO.