What is the SAS policy on missed (late) check-in ?
 

Dear all,

Can someone tell me the SAS policy for late check-in, and/or point to where I could find it ?

I am thinking of the situation where you arrive at the check-in desk a few minutes late, not a major delay. Some other airlines have a window (say, one hour after check in closes) where you can get rebooked to next available flight for a nominal fee. Is there such policy with SAS ? I can not find anything on their website.

If that helps refine the answer, the ticket would be "Go" (not Plus or Business), airport would be CPH and the flight to CDG or BRU.

Mange tak !! :)

J-

PS: I tried to raise with customer service chat but the agent typed a one liner "buy a new ticket" and disconnected !! :td:

Certainly no official policy that allows free/nominal-fee rebooking, but some leeway to apply flat-tire rule.

But going CPH-BRU/CDG you would not check in at a desk anyhow. Use OLCI, print (or get sent to your smart phone) a boarding pass, and head directly to the gate.

Thank you for the fast response ! ^

I did think of online check-in but in this case we will have to drop two bags at the counter. So slightly rewording the question could be - what if we are electronically checked in but slightly late to drop the bags ? (and there is certainly no official policy for the point worded like that). Any experience ?

OR - if four are travelling together on single booking, can a scout go in advance of the rest, get four BP's from the robot and then drop the bags with not all passengers present, to save time until the others arrive and we proceed together to security ? Or is it needed that all travellers are present at the time of bag drop for ID check or other ?

Reason for all this is travel to the family for Christmas on a slightly tight schedule between end of school and getting to airport - I can easily see slight delays appearing, whether missing /delayed bus or long queues at airport bag drop. Ahh, the joys of family travel ;)

Thank you.

J-

Always check-in with the OLCI! Your chances of getting the bag dropped after the bag-drop time closes are not great but better than missing check-in which always ends up in your reservation being automatically cancelled.

Shouldn't be a problem. It depends a bit where you are going to. For some destinations check-in with the machine will not work and you will need to bring the passports to the check-in counter. Still, in general just one of you should be enough to show the passports and drop the bags (*). Just tell the check-in agent the rest of the group is in the rest room ;)

(*) in the last few years only United agents in the US has made trouble and insisted every pax needs to presents its own passport and bag

If you're planning to fly immediately before Christmas, chances are that most flights are fully booked anyway, so the question is probably moot. If you miss your flight, it doesn't matter whether they are willing to rebook you - or if you're willing to buy a new ticket - because the next flight has already been fully booked for weeks.

Let me rephrase that reply a bit:

Most flights on the immediate days before Christmas, such as between 18-23 December, are fully booked. So, it's probably impossible to get on such a flight on short notice.

But flights on 24 and 25 December usually have a light load, so light that many of them are in fact cancelled. So, if you're late for check-in, chances are that you'll have to wait until the 24th or 25th to get available seats. If you're not willing to risk that, I'd not recommend taking such a risk.

IN BRU they use SN/Swissport as ground handling agent, in CDG Alysia. Both these will insist on punctual reporting for checkin as flights are full in the pre Xmas holiday rush, especially if its the last day of school. They are very unlikely to be flexible since the next flight is equally overbooked.

Checkin luggage as a group should be OK if you present ID.

Even if you can rebook for free it doesn't mean that the fare difference is waived. But I have luckily no experiences concerning such a situation.

I think the OP is travelling FROM CPH.

How about dropping your bags, before going to school?

It may be of little quidance to the OP, but here is my recent experience on "late check in" for bags with SQ at SIN.

I had done OLCI but arrived very late at SIN (20 min before dep. and entirely my own fault) - obviously it was too late for bagage drop but the agent printed my BP and suggested I ran to the gate (obviously the gate was a far away as possible; F60 at T2) and SQ would accept the bag on a later flight. I made to the gate 10 min before dep. and was the last pax to board + the bag arrived on the same flight the following day; it was labelled with a special/late check-in label. Pretty well done by SQ I would say.

Whether SK will do the same, I have no idea, but I suppose if you have done OLCI and you print bagage tags from the check-in kiosk, I think you can always blame confusion, queue, lack of sign for bagage drop whatever, for being a few minutes late at the bagage drop counter (there is no way you can drop the bags on the conveyor belt on your own)

Anyway, to my knowledge there is no practise/rule that SK will rebook you for free if you are deemed to have missed the deadline check-in. If you are late for check-in = you are on your own = you need to buy a new ticket if you would like to fly.

If you miss your flight to BRU, just buy the RyanAir flight to CLR (just south of brussels). It regularly sells for 10 euros or even less, it's one of the cheapest scheduled flights in existence.

Morning check-in of bags is a good idea.

May not be sold at 10 EUR shortly before flight.

Quite risky strategy, I had a miss on SN in BRU going to Malaga (5 mins after checkin closing, I was checked in, but had luggage, so checkin staff called for gate acceptance of luggage, but was refused). They offered me to travel with no bagage or day after on morning flight - I asked if I could go and luggage day after, but they refused.