Oversized personal items
 

Hey guys,
This post is more for the European members, but I've seen a big increase in people taking extremely large backpacks (e.g. Swiss gear, Tumi Shaw,...) on board of European flights as personal items in addition to a full sized carry on. I have yet to see the first to be denied boarding or request to gate check the carry on.

What are your thoughts? are you seeing the same trend? Have you seen people being spoken to about it?
I'm not even going into the discussion if they are putting those big backpacks under the seat or not....

Thanks for the feedback!

I saw somebody on a recent flight board with a regular rollerboard carry-on as well as an enourmous North Face duffle bag that had straps so it could be worn as a backpack. Neither of the bags would be anywhere close to fitting under the seat, and it was definitely well past the normal defintion of a backpack as a personal item but neither the GA or FA even seemed to notice. I've also seen the trend of people taking really big softsided bags that are way bigger than the allowed dimensions for a carry-on, but sadly nobody seems to question the size of non-rollerboard carry-on bags.

I have seen persons with really huge personal bags in addition to their carryon. And it's never seemed to be an issue

Ask the GA. If the GA says "yes," you're good to go. If they say "no," then don't do it.

It's that easy.

Yes, more and bigger items brought on board in the least couple of years. Just a result of the HBO fares a lot of carriers now adopt. Only some airlines at some airports (e.g. LH/OS at VIE) do very strict enforcement of the limits in carry-on bags and for personal items. Guess we will see more of that if the trend continues.

What I see quite regularly is, that e.g. for SAS in CPH the GA will walk around the gate area and tag peoples over-sized bags (doesn't matter if carry-on or a so called personal item) before even boarding starts. Depends on the mood of the GA if they will be put in the hold or just tagged for delivery at the aircraft.

I think its becoming an issue everywhere. In my experience, most GAs only care about wheeled bags, and people have caught on - small wheeled bag, but a massive backpack, hoping they don't notice...

It depends on the airline.

Flying TAP from LHR the other day, they were super-strict - anything over 8kg was not permitted at all.

I was on a flight with a bunch of college kids and each of them brought a guitar on board with them. Of course, this was in addition to their primary luggage, their rollerbags. Obviously the guitars weren't going to fit under the seats... Pity the poor chumps who boarded late and found the OH bins filled with guitars.

Well, in a similar instance I have asked the cabin crew to take care of the guitars as they are plainly grossly over-sized to bring on-board. Got the evil-eye stare from the musicians (5 kids in their early 20s), but almost all other pax around me looked quite happy and the bins quickly were filled up with bags and carry-ons which were stored under the seat before. Would have been a quite long 7 hours flight with all the bags on the floor taking up any chance to move the feet.

The crew was okay with removing the guitars and send them to the hold, actually the purser called the GA quite annoyed and asked why they didn't took them away during boarding.

No, idea if the guitars were damaged, but too be honest. I don't care! Just buy a decent hard case (ideally a rectangular one, not the guitarshaped) and they will be fine.

Also the routing. There's a current thread on the EK Forum about Indian (I think) destinations where carry on baggage limits have regularly been abused so they are now being clamped down on.

People will try everything they can and sometimes get burnt over it and then post reviews how .... the airline is and unfair the fare structure because they paid so much to gate check. Um yeah.

I myself spent quite a few hours this last week searching for the perfect personal item, I will post a review of the Fjällräven Kånken Laptop 15" when it shows up. Teaser trailer: it fits both Air Canada and United personal item restrictions and is quite close to be the largest to do so.

My custom built bass goes into a custom fitted pelican gun case. I can part with it while it sits in the baggage hold.

If you are a really, really good musician you can fly private and put your guitar almost anywhere you want. Next tier's guitar gets their own seat.