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NY Times: Lost Luggage Is Rare, but the Trauma Can Be Acute



 
 
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Old June 8th, 2004, 07:42 AM
Sufaud
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Default NY Times: Lost Luggage Is Rare, but the Trauma Can Be Acute

New York Times
Lost Luggage Is Rare, but the Trauma Can Be Acute

By SHARON McDONNELL

Published: June 8, 2004

Picture1:
http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/...medstorexl.jpg
Caption:
Rick Owens for The New York Times
Shoppers at the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, Ala., look
through clothing that was recovered from luggage left at airports.

Picture2:
http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/...LOST.scott.jpg
Caption:
Rick Owens for The New York Times
Scott Roberts shops at the center with sons Ian, 3, and Andrew, 6.


Even for business-travel lore, which is as rich in horror stories as
lost luggage, Valerie Bent's ordeal stands out.

Ms. Bent, then an executive with a dot-com company, arrived in Buenos
Aires two years ago on a Varig Airlines flight from São Paulo, but her
suitcase did not. She had to rush out to buy clothes for a business
meeting the next morning. When the bag did not show up the following
day, she made a second shopping trip.

On the third day, Varig found her suitcase and promised to deliver it
to her hotel within 45 minutes. After several hours ticked by,
however, the airline informed Ms. Bent that the driver had been
involved in an accident and her suitcase had been hurled onto a
highway. Varig then sent a second car to retrieve it, but by then the
suitcase was squashed.

"My suitcase had tire marks all over it; everything inside had
exploded - the shampoo, toothpaste - and my three suits were
completely destroyed," said Ms. Bent, now a public relations executive
for CCG Investor Relations in Las Vegas.

Varig said the mix-up was the fault of American Airlines, which had
flown Ms. Bent to São Paulo from Los Angeles, she said. But American
blamed Varig. Neither carrier would compensate Ms. Bent for the loss,
though American upgraded her to first class from business class for
the return flight, she said.

Tribulations like Ms. Bent's are actually rather rare. In the United
States last year, just 4 of 1,000 passengers arrived without their
checked baggage on the 17 biggest airlines, according to the
Transportation Department, and the loss rate has declined
substantially for nine of those airlines over the last five years. But
such statistics are scant comfort for the 2.2 million people whose
checked bags ended up missing in 2003.

The airline with the worst record in 2003 was a Delta Air Lines
subsidiary, Atlantic Southeast, which mishandled 15.41 bags per 1,000
people, the department said. American Airlines, the world's biggest
carrier, lost 4.45 bags per 1,000 people, the department said, while
the carrier with the best record, Alaska Airlines, lost 2.56 bags per
1,000 passengers. Three low-cost airlines - AirTran, JetBlue and
Southwest - had rates of 2.84, 3.21 and 3.35, respectively.

It is bad enough for people without their luggage to have to buy
clothes, but it is even worse when they can't. According to Tim
Bruins, a senior account executive at the Maritz Travel Company, a
corporate travel agency in St. Louis, that was the fate of 40
passengers who arrived on an Iberia Airlines flight in Barcelona for a
cruise that his firm organized. Deprived of their luggage, they were
unable to buy new clothes at the first port, Villefranche, France,
because it was Sunday and shops were closed, or at the next port,
Corsica, because it was a national holiday there.

"At this point, my staff and I began swapping clothes with the
participants to make them as comfortable as possible," Mr. Bruins
said. "At Rome, our next port, all guests without luggage went and
bought new clothes. Of course, all the luggage showed up that day."

What are frequent fliers to do to prepare for the worst? It helps to
pack a change of clothing in a carry-on bag, to include identification
inside of luggage in case the luggage tag falls off, and, if checked
bags fail to arrive at the airport, to file a claim immediately with
the airline's baggage services agent. Passengers can collect up to
$2,500 for each lost, stolen or damaged bag on domestic flights, but
only a flat $9.07 a pound for lost goods on international routes.

John K. Hawks, co-author of "Traveler's Rights: Your Legal Guide to
Fair Treatment and Full Value" (Sourcebooks, 2003) and executive
director of the nonprofit Consumer Travel Rights Center, recommends
taking photos of the contents of luggage before it is packed, as well
as writing a packing list.

"It comes down to persistence and documentation,'' he said. "Don't
walk away unless you've gotten what you needed from the baggage
services agent. The key is to get in writing what the airline will do
and the person's name who took your claim."

Mr. Hawks has two other pieces of advice: "Never pack any item in your
checked luggage that you cannot afford to lose. And never leave
anything on the plane you wouldn't want to never see again, no matter
what the airlines say."

For passengers who wonder where vanished luggage goes, the answer is
often Scottsboro, Ala., home of the Unclaimed Baggage Center, a store
that buys unclaimed bags from airlines and sells their contents to the
public. Begun in 1970 by Doyle and Sue Owens on card tables stocked
with lost luggage from Greyhound buses, the center has grown into one
of Alabama's biggest tourist attractions, selling more than a million
lost luggage and cargo items each year. Some of the more interesting
objects that the company has seen include artificial limbs, a
40.95-carat emerald, a United States Navy guidance system for a F-16
fighter jet (which was returned to the government), a suit of armor,
mummified Egyptian artifacts from 1,500 B.C. and a Barbie doll whose
head fell off to reveal $500 in bills stashed inside the body.

"It's a little like Christmas every day, and it never ceases to amaze
me what we find in the luggage," said Bryan Owens, owner of the
Unclaimed Baggage Center and son of its founders.

To reduce the rate of lost luggage, the airline industry is turning to
technology, like tiny radio transmitter chips with unique identifying
numbers on luggage tags that allow bags to be tracked continuously.
McCarran Airport in Las Vegas plans to start phasing in this system,
known as RFID for radio- frequency identification, in the summer.
McCarran can use the initiative because it supplies the computerized
check-in process for virtually all the airlines that use it, according
to Samuel Ingalls, the airport's information systems manager, while
other airlines typically use their own systems.

"While the optical scanning rate with bar codes on the tags is 80 to
90 percent, our target is 99.8 percent validity with the chips," he
said.

McCarran's RFID technology is from Matrics, a Rockville, Md., company
that is working with six American and three overseas airports to
improve the baggage-handling process. Delta Air Lines also has a trial
under way with Matrics on its flights from Jacksonville to Atlanta.

Once burned, twice shy. After Merle Ward's luggage was delayed for a
day on a United Airlines flight, he got only an overnight kit with a
toothbrush, toothpaste, shaver and mouthwash from the airline. So the
next time his luggage was delayed - for two days after flying to
Cologne, Germany - he was prepared.

"Now I always pack a change of underwear, fresh shirt and a sport coat
in a carry-on," said Mr. Ward, manager of the Ford Motor Company's
Arizona Proving Ground for trucks in Yucca, Ariz. "It was a real
learning experience."


http://travel2.nytimes.com/2004/06/0...ss/08lost.html


COMMENT: Always put a tag with your name, address and telephone number
INSIDE your luggage, as well as an identifying tag outside. Many
household insurance policies and floaters limit compensation to bags
that are so identified.
  #2  
Old June 9th, 2004, 02:18 AM
Quantum Foam Guy
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default NY Times: Lost Luggage Is Rare, but the Trauma Can Be Acute

"Sufaud" wrote in message
. ..
New York Times
Lost Luggage Is Rare, but the Trauma Can Be Acute

snip
To reduce the rate of lost luggage, the airline industry is turning to
technology, like tiny radio transmitter chips with unique identifying
numbers on luggage tags that allow bags to be tracked continuously.
McCarran Airport in Las Vegas plans to start phasing in this system,
known as RFID for radio- frequency identification, in the summer.
McCarran can use the initiative because it supplies the computerized
check-in process for virtually all the airlines that use it, according
to Samuel Ingalls, the airport's information systems manager, while
other airlines typically use their own systems.


A lot of people (needlessly, I think) fear RFID, but this is a great example
of how important this technology will be in the very near future. The cost
savings for virtually all industries is astounding.


 




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