Luggage of a no show
 

If a pax does not show up and their luggage is unloaded i.g. in FRA, where and when / how fast can this luggage be collected? Is there any fine the airline can impose?

Rather than no show, pls tell the gate agent/transfer desk that you will not be travelling so there is time to retrieve your luggage before closing the gate/push back. It is really inconsiderate to let the gate agents page you and maybe delay the flight waiting for to board the flight and when you don't, delay the flight because your luggage needs to retrieved from the cargo hold.

Do you mean you leave the airport without collecting your luggage? It's kept in storage for a few months and then donated to charity I believe.

Oh, misunderstood. Tell an agent asap. I expect you may have to wait at least an hour.

Let me guess, you purchased a cheap hidden-city-ticketing fare (e.g. X-FRA-Y, Y-FRA-X, with you being based near FRA) and now you want to get the luggage in FRA and exit the plane there.

I don't think they're going to be happy about it. But at the same time I also couldn't see how they could impose you any fine. They could just send your luggage all the way to the end destination X and have you sort out how to get your stuff back though.

Better ask kindly when checking in to only check it through to FRA. But they don't always do that.

Technically you are breaking the carriage contract and technically they can charge you the fare from where you stop carriage. I have never heard of this being done. I have heard of them "not being able to retrieve bag" and needed to wait a few days and pick it up from the airport (they would not deliver it).

As a passenger sitting on a delayed plane now, delayed because a missing passenger hasn't showed up and they waited and are now, 15 minutes after scheduled departure time searching for the bag to offload, I can tell you this is inconsiderate and rude to hundreds of others. If you're doing hidden city ticketing, don't check luggage through.

OP already asked on this back in July, or maybe this was for another trip. It certainly looks like he plans to get off in FRA and will try to short check his bag.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/star-...-last-leg.html

In the USA, the airline sell untraceable unclaimed bags to a discount store in Alabama.

https://www.unclaimedbaggage.com/

Please follow the redirect as we relocate this thread to travelbuzz.

~beckoa, co-moderator Information Desk

The airline is not allowed to fly the bag if the passenger doesn't board so it will definitely be offloaded. If it's sensible it will insist that the difference between the correct fare and the hidden city fare is paid before handing the bag over.

I believe if a pax who already checked in fails to board, they would have to go through all the cargo and find that one luggage and remove it.

I've heard stories where some pax would try to save money on loading luggage by carrying oversized carry on and board the plane the last minute, so by that time the FA can't refuse them flights anymore since that would add to a long delay, and they had to allow them on the plane.

How long it takes to locate and off-load luggage is a different question from how long a delay may be caused. Presuming that the flight could otherwise have pushed ontime, when a bag is pulled, the entire weight & balance must be recalculated. That must be double-checked by Dispatch (another licensed pilot) and all of that fed back into the airctraft's computer. Depending on the aircraft, this may be a manual task.

At busy airports, the aircraft may also lose its slot and that may mean simply sitting around for a period of time until another slot opens up.

Thus, the issue is not whether it takes 5 or 15 minutes to locate the bag, but the knock-on delays.

Not all carriers will short-check bags as it is a red flag for hidden city ticketing fraud and some carriers have started to crack down for that reason. Others may not take drastic action such as refaring a ticket, but gently "fire" you as a customer by freezing your frequent flyer account.

You can't predict what will happen because much of this is dependent on the consequences. If you manage to cause a carrier to pay out EC 261/2004 compensation to 100+ passengers, it may be a bit less compassionate than under other circumstances.

I'm reading into this that you're talking about checking in, checking luggage, then not boarding the plane. Correct? Never mind why you would do that, but the luggage definitely would be taken off if headed to the US and probably taken off regardless. Your baggage would be subject to inspection. The airline might choose to fine you. Depending on various circumstances, the baggage may be considered "suspicious" and destroyed.

Whatever you're planning on doing, don't.

So I guess the morale of the story is: if you are going to hidden city ticket, don't check baggage?

Unless you will have to recollect and recheck your bag for the final leg anyway, in which case you could just pick up the bag and leave. This is common in the US, but not at all in Europe.

Seriously... if you are playing the game enough to know about hidden city ticketing, then travel light.

If your bag isn't worth enough to you to be bothered by having it claimed by the airline as lost, then sent to the unclaimed luggage graveyard, why bring all that stuff with you in the first place?