TSA's poor repacking causes damage
 

When packing to return home to SEA from MIA (AS17 on 10-14), I wrapped my sunglasses (in soft case) inside of a sweatshirt and packed the sweatshirt in the center of my checked bag. I have done this many times and have never had an issue. My bag was TSA inspected after it was checked, and its contents repacked. Whatever TSA dumb A$$ inspected my bag decided that my sun glasses would be safest unwrapped from the sweatshirt and placed on the top of everything else in my bag.
Well, when I unpacked at home my glasses were destroyed, bent completely out of shape with deep scratches across one of the lenses. I called TSA's 1-866 number at the bottom of the "Notice of Baggage Inspection" slip that was inside my suitcase and asked for a claim form to be sent to me.
My question is, Has anyone else had any similar experiences, and does TSA actually make good on damage claims (they dont seem to be good at much else).

Thanks

You're lucky you got your sunglasses back at all. Having said that, you owe it to yourself to file a claim against the TSA. It sounds like the evidance is overwhelming that TSA negligence caused the damage and not the airlines.

Bear in mind that the TSA uses the standard USG damage claim form, which is incredibly long & complicated and is designed for all sorts of claims aginst the government. (I've filled out several of these forms over the years to claim household goods damage during military moves.)

Many people become intimidated and don't follow through. You've got the TSA love note and the physical evidence of a screener's negligence. Press on and be prepared to wait upwards of a year. It's a good idea to include digital pictures of the suitcase, the love note and the damaged sunglasses as well as credible proof of replacement cost. Don't forget to include shipping and sales tax. Give the TSA about four months to respond. If they haven't, copy the whole package with a cover letter to your congressman. Then, the TSA will have to do twice the work: answer the "congressional" and respond favorably to your damage claim.

Good luck and don't give up the fight.

My wife's claim with the TSA over the solid deodorant they confiscated from her carry-on shortly after 8/10 has so far gotten only a "You may hear from us in 4-6 months" or some such response indicating receipt. It was indeed a daunting claim form, but we felt it necessary to file a claim even for a $8-10 item so that they cannot continue to act so carelessly with others' property.

What would happen if somone sued the TSA, or possibly Kip Hawly and sent them a subpeona? Can you issue a governement agency a subpeona. Aren't they bound by the same rules as everyone else?

Two words: "Governmental Immunity." As such, you can only sue the TSA after you have exhausted administrative remedies (and sometimes you may not sue at all). So you have to go through the administrative claim process.

The goons never repack anything correctly or even close to it. I initially wrap the wifi router etc with bubble wrap and t-shirts. Ster careful inspection (yeah right) they wad up the bubble wrap (and that aint easy), wad up the t-shirts and put all the hard items in the luggage beside each other. They then steal about 1/3 of some rx (they love to steal Zanax), open the electric razon case, but not close it etc. Bottom line, I have filed 3 times and none settled to date. I also never got a human voice on the 800 TSA telephone line either. A totally disgusting experience.

MisterNice

One claim, settled in 6 months. I was only after $21, though.

I have a buddy who is a professional TV photographer. When he flys he brings 20 cases with him (Excess baggage doesn't bother him-he gets the "media" rate and can charge it to the client anyway.) Only his camera gets its own seat.(Mr. Ikegami has a FF card)

One of his cases has a light kit in it with extra bulbs. He keeps his spare bulbs in the original packing so each bulb is in a special plastic baggie, then wrapped in foam and finally in a clearly labeled box. The boxes fit in a preformed section of the case.

There has more then one time that he arrives at his job with the TSA love note in his light kit. They pull all the bulbs out, put their fingers on them (they are halogen and that messes them up) and repack them so poorly that they break.

He tells me that these bulbs are $50+ each and not the type of thing you can get at the hardware store. It ends up being a last minute scramble to find a theater supply store or FedEx from his supplier

With this and all the new restrictions it is cheaper for him to drive if he can make it within 15 hours. Plus he arrives at the job with his own vehicle (it is amazing how he fits so much stuff in a surburban) with security cages in it.

See this post Will TSA Pay for Broken Items? for the story of how the TSA broke my cellphone/PDA and eventually paid for it. The paperwork was a PITA, the TSA rep who called me back was kind of a jerk, and the government check was initally mailed to the wrong address (it comes from the US Treasury, just like a tax refund) but they did pay it.

Thank you for the replies. I will definitely follow through with the claim. I think the value of the glasses is (or was) about $150... Just enough to make me follow through and not give up.

If there are any lawyers out there, how do we go about starting a class action law suit... "Flying Public vs. TSA"? Frequent harassment, abuse, negligence, ... The list goes on and on.

If you don't get any satisfaction in a reasonable amount of time, you can also pressure them by filing a FOIA request for any action taken in regards to your claim.

Here is the TSA's FOIA rep's info:

# Transportation Security Administration
Catrina Pavlik
Associate Director
Office of Security
West Building, 4th Floor
Room 432-N, TSA-20
601 South 12th Street
Arlington, VA 22202-4220
telephone number: (571) 227-2300
fax number: (571) 227-1406

If he's got a starter pistol and the cases are hard-shelled, he should pack the pistol in there and declare it. :)

No surprise there, as Xanax is a Schedule III Controlled Substance with high street value.

I have to ask (rhetorically) why you would pack your meds in checked luggage to begin with ...

That'd be Schedule IV ;)

It was a dumb mistake on my part. I inadvertly tossed them in the to be checked bag in a last minute trip packing rush. When getting a replacement rx from my doc, he said the going street value for Xanax or Valium is about $10-$20 per pill.

MisterNice