stimpy

A friend flew Air Caraibes SDQ to ORY 4 days ago and her bag didn't make it. She registered this at the baggage office at ORY and has been waiting to hear from them. I called yesterday, which is really, really difficult. All the numbers I tried just have a recording that say "we aren't available now, try back later". After a dozen tries I finally got a human who said we just have to wait. 5 days in fact.

Then soon after on the baggage claim site, which is www.theairgate.com posted a note to her from Air Caraibes saying that they are happy that she has been re-united with her baggage. Which is untrue. And they say that they are only contracted to deliver her bags to the destination and that she cannot claim any compensation.

Then to address her question about priority baggage tags (she was in first class), they said, sorry, we have given 500 miles to your FF account. The following sentence says that if she wants to join their FF program, to go to the website! I don't think I've ever seen a worse letter from customer service!

I read some EU regs that say we must first request the baggage from the airline and if that doesn't resolve the problem then we must go to court. But is there really no other recourse?

olivedel

Hello stimpy,

Very sorry for your friend. I know too well how frustrating it is to have a luggage missing, and the lack of information is even worse.

First, did she finally get her luggage? I am surprised they did not give her a WorldTracer case number. I have no clue of what www.theairgate.com is!

If she does not get her luggage within 21 days, she will be entitled to get compensation according to the Montréal convention, and if the luggage has not been traced.

Often1

It is unclear from your post whether the luggage has been located and simply not delivered or if it is still actually missing. If located and not delivered, that is a local courier problem best resolved locally.

It not located, it is back to the frustration of calling. Focus on locating the bag. Compensation is a separate issue and raising it now simply confuses agents and slows the process.

Once the bag is returned, figure out whether and what compensation might be appropriate. If the bag & contents are not damaged, all that is due may be some small amount for purchases necessary by the delay. I would not spend anything without prior approval or a willingness to absorb the loss.

As noted, at 21 days the bag is considered lost, even if it is later found and returned. At that point, your friend can claim for the loss.

Bottom line is to focus on locating and obtaining the bag. Stay away from compensation issues other than asking about immediate needs, until you have the bag in hand. Sometimes it is having multiple people working on the same thing which causes further delays.

stimpy

I have no clue if the bag has been located. theairgate.com offers no usable means of communication. They don't accept email and their phone is always busy. The only people I can reach is the department for Air Caraibes that takes over after the bag has been missing for more than 5 days. I'll call them Monday. Meanwhile the person who lost the bag is going to Orly tomorrow to try and find it. It's a bit of an expensive trip, but she really wants her bag.

olivedel

I tried to browse Air Caraibes website and it is indeed hard to find a phone number/email to contact people about a missing bag. Might not be something very frequent for them, as AFAIK, they do not have connections out of ORY.
Please let us know the outcome of your call Monday.

Oh my... As a friend you should try to tell her not to go. It is a complete waste of time!