iainmc

<tl;dr> United BNA Baggage lost our bags 3 times in 4 days...

Last weekend, we went from San Diego to Nashville for a bunch of good fun with some friends. In my time flying United, I can't say I've ever had a worse experience. Weather issues happen, as do plane service problems and bags get lost. We struck both but it's not that that is my issue. It's the baggage department. I never check bags on 95% of my flights, but when i am flying with my wife I don't bother with carry on - I'm going to be waiting anyway.

1. Outbound - san-iah-bna our San Diego flight took off late and our flight to Nashville was missed and we were bumped to the next flight (downgraded too, but that's no biggie) - my wife's bag didn't make it to Nashville. Next morning, the app showed it had arrived but no contact worked and the app just showed arrived at 9.40am - we heard nothing from contact, etc - eventually at around 4pm we just went back to the airport, found it in a huge pile sitting outside the baggage claim and left. No one stopped us or said a word...
2. Inbound #1 - bna-den-san june 25 - flight takes off, front landing gear is stuck down and we return. I'd rather be safe so it was not a thing to complain about. Flight eventually cancelled. After a wait, we got the plan to leave the next day - the United employee was great. However, getting bags from baggage was like a visit to the 3rd level of hell. Anyone who had a direct flights bags were bought back to baggage claim - some genius decided all bag that had a stop should not be brought out. After a 90 minute wait (after the hour rebooking) eventually we got the bags. No communication, no real reason. We had to go see one person in baggage claim 3 times before eventually they came out. So a 10am flight that turned around became a 5 hour experience.
3. Inbound #2 - bna-ord-san. delays, etc etc. Somehow, my wife's bag never left Nashville. Now the detail is "Tracing Process Continues, check back later" which is a change from the original entries that showed it going to Denver (!) I wish they'd lost my bag, which had an airtag - hers doesn't...

I realize it's a much smaller airline, but I also do ~75k a year on Alaska - a lot more with family so a more checked bags - we have never had an issue like this with their baggage service - they've lost bags but have give out things where you can talk to a person, they update frequently and take escalations for flyers with milage plan status. the other 3 or so times we got phone calls updating us, telling us when it would arrive. Any suggestions of another method if trying to find this stuff?

/iainmc
p.s. yes i am an idiot for not transferring my airtag to her bag.

jsloan

Meanwhile -- and, admittedly, it's been a while -- when I had a luggage issue on AS, and asked them where my bag was, the response was "we're not FedEx."

UA operations are a complete disaster at the moment. Lost luggage is not going to be their priority -- they're trying to get people where they need to go first.

Almost all misdirected luggage is eventually found. If you're lucky, it'll take them a few days and they'll pay you for the bag and keep looking for it anyway. For a while, they were offering $1500 with no receipts needed, but that language seems to have been struck from their website.

iainmc

Oh - one other part to the story. After we went and got our bag from the airport in Nashville, they sent another random bag to us. The bag had come from Miami and the tag had no relation to our bags tag number. Our bag is a black tumi - this was a green some other brand. I refused delivery.

/i

exerda

On the last point, UA contracts out bag delivery (and IIRC, the same delivery services are often used by multiple airlines at that airport). The question is whether UA gave them that bag as yours, or whether the delivery service picked up or tried delivering the wrong bag to you. It's still unacceptable, but not directly UA's fault.

I'm sorry that you had such baggage issues, too... I had a bad stretch a few years ago where not only was nearly every bag delayed, but getting them delivered was often worse than a trip to a blind dentist performing a root canal. I felt like I should be on a name basis with all the delivery drivers, except for the fact they usually showed up sometime between 2-4am when I was thankfully asleep. I had bags go on trips I missed, including weird diversions across the country. I had bags miss flights where I had a 3+ hour connection, and didn't arrive until the end of the trip or even had to be sent back by ground staff since I was already headed home. Then it got better, and I haven't had many issues since.

The point is, it's never fun, and how the airline handles it can leave a sour taste in your mouth for sure. All I can suggest at this point is making a short and to the point complaint via email or the web site, and you'll likely get some miles tossed your way. And hope the (un)luck of the draw doesn't strike again.

boss315

While slightly off topic, I have to agree on another front. Nashville is one of the most expensive airports to fly in and out of. We moved here from LAS so were used to the leisure fares, which I agree are somewhat low many times. But trying to do business out of Nashville has soured many clients (I work with schools and non-profits), due to the air fare expense that they see. For example, BNA-AMS is $948 (economy), $1800 (prem economy), $5k-7K business...in October! If I use miles to go to ORD, the same flights are $750-$800 (economy), $1429 (prem economy), and $3300-$3500 in business. This is consistent all year round!

WheelsUpGal

I moved to Nashville in 2010 and loved the airport - it was easy to navigate, had live music upon arrival, a great Starbucks pre-Security with a big glass window where you could watch for your friends and family. Now the 'on site' parking is very expensive and the cell phone lot is (I think?) 5 miles away? I park off-site now. And I would always fly to EWR or ORD to position myself for a long haul flight (and spend the night before). Mostly because United kept flying the small Embraer jets that were uncomfortable and problematic. Finally bit the bullet and bought a 3 flight trip to Norway in the Winter and what do they do? Change from a big plane our of BNA to an Embraer. Knock on wood, haven't had any problems with luggage but I DID purchase an AirTag just for this trip!

EWR764

I thought this would be a comment on United's gate area at BNA, which is third-world.

With such a small gate footprint, not to mention hardly any seating, and no lounge, it's not a surprise that UA is a nonfactor in this market.

SFO 1K

I too thought this was about the gate area, which is dreadful.

As relates to a 1K having baggage issues, I always file the proper claim with the BSO person, and they are aware I'm a 1K and I tell them where to deliver the bag and leave. Always with a smile, and "I know this isn't your fault, so let's just get this report done and I'll get out of your way". None of this waiting hours to get the bag back at the airport. I follow along with the provided link/tracing and sometimes will call 1K and tell them I need baggage help and they take care of me.

emcampbe

Interestingly enough, I was originally booked on UA redeye SFO-BNA last night, as part of an award itinerary to YYZ, before having to cancel the entire trip a couple of days ago for completely external reason. Interestingly that flight was canceled, as was the morning departure - seemingly due to no crew (on both flights), almost 100% due to the east coast mess affecting pretty much everywhere (was going to try to get on the nonstop to YYZ as well at airport - that flight was originally delayed 3 hours, then cxld as well due to crew - so I guess it�s kind of a blessing in disguise I�m not going.

ha�.i lived in CVG from 2008-21 - talk about expensive airports. It was expensive no matter where you were trying to get to for a long time and for several years was almost all CR2/E45 - even as far as DEN (I flew DEN-CVG in an E45 once before I never would agree to that again�we ended up flying out of DAY and CMH often due to fares and often better aircraft. In the mid 2010s, it changed as DL backed out of a hub, and the airport successfully lobbied F9, Allegiant and then WN to fly - I never flew any of those carriers - but got the fare and schedule situation under control (since UA needed to compete with everyone else then). Took a long time, but wss
much better in the end.

I saw the title and figured it would be about the airport itself as well. Bags are always a PITA when the bag system doesn�t work and delivering delayed baggage goes awry, but that happens just about everywhere�back in the day, I had more problems with baggage the handful of times I flew US then l with UA in my entire 20+ years as a premier.

WheelsUpGal

A long time ago when I was a teen, EVERY SINGLE TIME we flew back from anywhere to BDL (Hartford) our bags were delayed by a day. Never (knock on an AirTag) lost but always delayed. Haven't been to the UA gate at BNA in maybe 5 years? I do remember flying DL once and they have/had a small 'club'. Some decent restaurants though.

LarryJ

About five years ago, the airport split the A-concourse in half to create a "temporary" hallway to route arriving international passengers from the immigration facility to the land-side.

The new main terminal great hall is open, but the new immigration facility, and associated gates, is not yet open. That will occur later this year. After that, the rebuild of the A-concourse can begin, though I haven't seen when it's actually scheduled to start.

The C-concourse satellite is in the later stages of construction. Spirit and Allegiant, I have heard, will be moving there. It'll be 6 or 7 additional gates.

The last parking garage, and it's on-site hotel, are nearing completion.

Not much United can do about their gates other than wait for the airport's upgrade and expansion plans to get to them.

iainmc

I'll close this off with we resolved our issues and got my wife's bag. The system was always reporting they were looking for bags, so I went back to San Diego Airport where there were ~500 bags around the baggage office. I met Ellen who is probably one of the most competent people working for United - she said it had been a trying week but was cool and calm. She said I saw that bag and i got it from back room in less than 5 minutes. If i was running United baggage, I'd offer those sort of people a 4 week transfer to train the under trained people at Nashville. but I'll never go to Nashville again with checked bags.

/i

PsiFighter37

BNA is way too undersized relative to how big Nashvilla has gotten. I hope the airport expansion that is underway meaningfully scales it up past current capacity, because if my recent visits are any indication, it is going to keep growing. I compare it to AUS, which had a fairly large (IIRC - been nearly a decade) airport in place even before the current explosion in population.

LarryJ

That seems to be the plan. The new Main Hall and combined security checkpoint can certainly support it.

The new CBP facility and central gates (between C and B concourses, are under construction as is the satellite concourse with its 6 or 7 gates which, I've heard, are going to Spirit and Allegiant.

Plans are to then extend the new D concourse and well as redevelop and extend A.

Put all together, that ought to be at least 15 to 20 more gates than are currently available. Even more, if A turns the corner and head westbound.