Hi there,

I had an interesting experience traveling from Bristol to Edinburgh on Easyjet on Monday and was wondering if any of you knowledgeable travelers have had any experience with or thoughts on this issue.

We arrived at the airport with only 5 mins till check in closed. Rushed to a desk, checked in our bag and got our two boarding passes.

Proceeded through security but just before I got to the metal detector I looked at my boarding pass and realised Easyjet had given me a pass under a completely different name flying to Geneva, not Edinburgh.

Ran back through security to Easyjet customer services as it was getting close to closing time.

Easyjet rep muttered something like "oh not again" when I showed him. They managed to print off my correct boarding pass and I got rushed through security to my flight. Which we caught, thankfully.

Annoyingly, they couldn't get my bag on the Edinburgh flight in time so it went to Geneva, under the wrong name. Luckily they found it and after two days, got it back to me.

Anyway, has anyone heard of this happening before? How can they possible give someone the wrong boarding pass and is it not a bit of a security lapse?

Also is there any kind of compensation I can claim for the inconvenience?

Thanks for your help.

Dave

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

Not sure how it would be a security lapse unless you think people going to Geneva are, per se, more dangerous than those going to Edinburgh. Think carefully before you answer, because I'm Geneva right now.

Seriously, if you were screened for weapons and explosives, it really doesn't matter, from a security viewpoint, what your boarding pass said. Even if it was a way to get past ID checks (which do not contribute to security anyway), a person with bad intents could hardly rely on getting the wrong boarding pass when they needed it.

I can understand your annoyance over the luggage, though. I've never had compensation where luggage went missing for two days, but you can always try. (I was always just ridiculously happy to get my luggage back!)

Thanks for welcome

I can see your point about it not really being a security issue. I guess I'm just annoyed at the incompetence of the Easyjet check in person which caused all the problems.

I am very happy to get it all back. Thanks for your thoughts, really appreciate it.

I disagree, to an extent, that there's no security issue. While I'm not big on the bag matching rules, his bags went on a separate plane, to a separate location, under a separate name. To the airlines, that's a rather big security lapse.

I don't think it can be seen by anyone as a security lapse since the separation wasn't his idea.

The security lapse is predicated on the concept that a pax could buy a ticket, check his luggage through and then simply not board the airplane. Then activate the radio controlled bomb in the luggage. In late 2001, I boarded an international flight from the US to Asia via Frankfurt and had a large crated checked industrial device on as overweight checked baggage on Lufthansa. Due to the then brand new security issues, I was late for the flight, (my ticket was bought on 9.10.2001 for a "-stan" country). The LH gate agent figured out I was at the security station and somehow managed to convince the crew to hold the departure until I got cleared. The regulations then, required the flight to offload baggage for a passenger who is not physically on the airplane. LH didn't want to unload a heavy crate, redo the dynamic chord calcs since it would take more time than waiting for me.

But the bad guy would have to know (with a high degree of certainty) that he was going to get the wrong boarding pass. For example, our new friend Dave would have to know he was going to get a boarding pass in some other name to GVA, get his bomb-laden luggage on that flight, then point out the mistake and safely go to EDI instead. It's a really long shot that you'll get a wrong BP.
AFAIK, they still offload baggage if the pax doesn't board. Unless the luggage has been delayed for some reason and is on a later flight to be reunited with the pax; the reasoning being that a bad guy couldn't count on that happening to exploit the security hole.

Davelaw00, I wonder what happened to the person whose BP you got; presumably they went to check in only to find they were already "checked in", unless the GVA flight was a lot later than the EDI flight and it was already sorted out by the time they checked in?

Three weeks ago I was at YYZ going to YVR, checked my baggage but got delayed (long lines) at security, the thing is I arrived 2 minutes late at the gate and was not allowed to board, had to wait for checked luggage to get offload (and had to get a new boarding pass for a later flight, check bags again, go thru security, etc. again). So, checked baggages seem not to travel if the pax won't board (I was happy with it, because I didn't want my luggage to arrive to Vancouver while I was still waiting for another flight in Toronto).

No--the airlines are always free to send the bags however they want. The rule is that the passenger can never separate from their bags, not that the bags can't separate from the passenger. If you expect the bags to be on your plane you won't carry a bomb unless it's a suicide mission--and that cuts down the number of people willing to do it and cuts down the skill level of the people trying it.

If the airline happens to separate your bag from you you won't know it.

(Actually, though, it does leave open one scenario. Build a suitcase bomb with a timer, clock and an altimeter. Plot a long stopover where there are earlier flights. When the bomb goes up in the air the timer counts off a bit less than the duration of the flight. Once that time has passed the bomb counts off the first stage. Once it's back on the ground this counts off the second stage and the bomb arms, set to explode at altitude. When the clock reaches a bit before your connecting flight the bomb disarms again. If the bomb remains with you for the whole trip it will not explode but if it gets sent on ahead it will.)