help: turkish airlines ignored united ticket 1st bag, charged me $115!
 

I just flew from cairo to adana on a united award booked on turkish airlines. the united confirmation clearly showed 1st bag fee: 0.00 EUR, up to 25 kg. However upon check in at cairo, the agents insisted turkish airlines was showing "0" baggage allowance and forced me to pay excess baggage fee (120 EGP = $7.65) per kg for my 1st bag, 15 kg so 1800 EGP = $115. The united ticket clearly showed 1st bag included and nowhere was I notified otherwise. Upon check in however TK insisted they have a "0 bags for award tickets policy" and I can't obtain my boarding pass til I pay up 1800 EGP. The agent said this seems to only happen with united, he recommended filing a complaint with united and/or TK to seek reimbursement. However, upon doing so, United is insisting that though they do show 1st bag free on their end, "we did not collect the fee so can't take any action" and TK is saying "we don't allow bags on partner award tickets so can't refund you"

Thus, there is a discrepancy between what the united confirmation showed and what TK's internal policy was
My questions are:
1) can I ask united to enforce what it says on their ticket confirmation? isn't there a contract of carriage policy about once you get a confirmation, it should be honored?
2) shouldn't I have been notified in advance if the partner airline baggage policy is different than stated on ticket?
3) do I have any reasonable options to resolve this? can I escalate to any specialized customer service desk?

any help would be appreciated!

You have a UA ticket, and enforcement should be through the US DOT.File a complaint with them.

sorry, this is wrong. US DOT only regulates flights that touch the US. That UA issued the ticket is completely irrelevant here, they are just a TA.

Your first course of action is to contact TK customer service. They might refund this pretty quickly. An agent at an outstation is often wrong when it gets to these things. Who at TK did you contact?
The agent is also incorrect that this has anything to do with UA at all; TK bag rules apply irrespective who issued the ticket, so don't trust any of the other nonsense you were told.
*A award tickets include a free bag and the UA ticket reflects that correctly.

I assume you paid the extra bag fees with a CC. You are within your rights to dispute this charge with your CC company. Submit your receipt and the ticket that shows a free bag. Should be pretty simple.

Unfortunately these things happen from time to time.

is this posted anywhere on star alliance site or T&Cs? this would GREATLY help my case!

already filed a customer service complaint, they told me to go eat cake... said "bonus point tickets with partner airlines don't include any baggage allowance"

the problem is TK is insisting there's no baggage allowance included whatsoever on partner airline award tickets, this is what I need to push back against... united said they still see the allowance but can't do anything

they want me to try resolving with merchant first

Yes, that is required, but you already tried it (and TK told you to go eat cake). Add your correspondence with TK to the complaint to your cc issuer; to evidence that you have tried to resolved it with the merchant but to no avail.

Wait does TK even have any ticket types that don't include checked baggage? What I take "bonus point tickets with partner airlines don't include any baggage allowance" to mean is that awards issued on partner airlines using TK miles, like for example, using TK miles to book an award flight on UA would not confer any baggage allowance, which is correct. Maybe trying complaining again but clarifying that you purchased a ticket for travel on TK and did not receive the baggage allowance for the route you flew as advertised on the TK website and would like a refund of the excess baggage fees you paid; leave your UA confirmation out of this, those are notoriously inaccurate.

Presuming that you have a US-issued credit card, this is easy. Simply file a partial chargeback for the amount of the bag fee (I presume that you paid enough cash in taxes & fees to cover this). You have an obligation to attempt to resolve this with the vendor, but you already attempted that both at check-in and with customer service. Either one was sufficient.

Make certain that you document this properly and that you keep any narrative short and to the point. You have a UA e-ticket receipt which clearly shows an allowance for the TK flight and a receipt from TK for the fee. Finally, you have the exchange with TK. Your narrative can include the TK agent's unwillingness to accept your UA e-ticket receipt showing the alliance.

The DOT rule on bags does not apply here. It only applies to tickets originating, terminating or connecting / stopping over in or through the US.

My guess is that this is resolved in very short order and that UA does not put up a fuss and then deals with TK (or doesn't bother). This is a common problem worldwide and won't be solved anytime soon.

Wait a minute. Do you suggest to file a charge back against UA/in the initial charge for the ticket? That doesn't seem right IMO. UA hasn't (unlawfully) charged the OP for the bag; it was TK.

The OP would need to file a charge back against TK as vendor for bag fee (presumably the OP paid to TK with cc).

Are you sure? While I am not a lawyer, I believe chargeback can be filled when the service one paid for is not delivered or charge was done without card owner's consent. TK charged for the excess baggage and delivered the service (i.e. baggage transportation) - might be a hard sell for a chargeback.

OP should be dealing with UA not TK, UA sold the ticket to OP and it doesn't matter whether it's point/cash. If the ticket states very clear that 1 checked bag was free (I had similar issue at CTS with NH when I was using a UA award ticket, but when I showed NH my e-ticket they waived the fee immediately).

I think OP should file a BBB case against UA since OP made an agreement with UA.

OP paid $115 to TK. He should initiate a chargeback of that amount for the TK item.

UA has zippo to do with this and any attempt to collect from UA will (quite properly) go nowhere. This was a ticket on a non-US carrier between two points outside the US, thus the DOT rule regarding baggage disclosure is inapplicable. Also not worth the effort given that there is a simple route via the TK charge.

I had an even worse experience, returning from SSH to DEN. Turkish Airlines charged me USD $672.94 for two bags (not oversized) despite the fact my reservation with United Airlines (its Star Alliance partner) clearly showed that there should be $0 charge. I am in the process of making a claim to Turkish. United already told me to "redirect my request" to Turkish. Nothing in my reservation put me on notice that I could be charged in this way. I blame all three: United for not warning that the $0 charge could be misleading; Turkish for not honoring the $0 charge in the reservation made by United its "Star Alliance partner" (agent); and Star Alliance for allowing this to happen among its partners. How can I ever trust any of them again when I travel internationally?

I guess redemption ticket? You cannot trust them. And I do not understand this... Both carriers know there is a problem and they do nothing to solve it. Maybe they should just feel the pain if people escalate to DOT and go through the chargeback route... Maybe worth adding as a sticky thread, so people are warned in advance? Mods - thoughts?

If you feel you need a sticky thread, it should be in the UA forum, because it is clearly a problem with UA members being advised of UA baggage policies instead of *A partner policies.