Four American Airlines baggage handlers charged with theft

If you recently passed through Philadelphia International airport, and arrived at your destination with items missing from your luggage, then you may have one of the fine gentlemen on the right to thank.

The four were arrested and charged last week with “multiple counts of criminal conspiracy, theft, unlawful taking, receiving stolen property, and attempted theft”. The men were part time employees of American Airlines, but may have screwed up last month when the airline saw signs of a problem.

Detectives started an investigation and set up security cameras. When the cameras caught the men helping themselves to electronics, cameras and jewelry, police arrested them. Each of the men had been working baggage for American Airlines for nine years.

A court date has been set for December 8, and the men were all released until then.

The most important lesson from this incident? Never, ever pack valuables in your checked luggage. Checked bags are for clothes and cheap souvenirs – anything of value should always go in your cabin bag, or be shipped to your destination.

What? You’re still paying the airlines to carry your bags?

Now that the airlines have raised, yet again, their fees for checked bags, it’s time to take another look at the alternative: shipping your bags, or better yet (if you’re staying in one place once you arrive) just the contents of your bag ahead of your arrival using economical ground shipping services.

Why deal with the airlines, when UPS Ground and FedEx Ground offer better tracking, insurance and security, can be much cheaper in some scenarios, and will actually refund your shipping fee if there’s a delay or loss? No waiting in line at the airport! No pilferage! No schlepping!

Airfarewatchdog.com has looked at four domestic route scenarios (short, medium, and long haul) and compared three shipping services and two airlines (one with high bag fees, and one with low fees) to see how much you can save by not entrusting your bags to the airlines.

As you can see from the chart, depending on route and method, the cost savings achieved from shipping vs. schlepping range from little or nothing to dramatic. But as we explain, even if costs are the same, dealing with a company like FedEx
can be much less stressful than with an airline.

Consider: a single 25-pound suitcase or shipment from Boston to San Francisco by FedEx Ground costs about $31 vs. $23-$25 on Delta or nothing on Southwest.

But once that suitcase weighs over 50 pounds, excess charges kick in on the airlines, even on Southwest: you’d pay $56 for a 55-lb. bag using USPS on that same Boston-San Francisco trip, but twice that on Delta, which adds an extra $90 fee each way for bags weighing over 50 pounds. Even Southwest will charge you $50 each way.

And if your bag is both heavy and oversized (larger than 61-62 linear inches), you’ll get hit with triple jeopardy on some airlines: a fee for the first bag, plus an overweight fee, plus an oversized fee. Such a bag might cost nearly $300 on Delta on a trip from Los Angeles to Seattle vs. under $40 via FedEx Ground.

Also of note: the typical 22-inch rolling suitcase weighs 9-10 lbs. and airlines will shun responsibility for what they consider “normal wear and tear” if the suitcase or its wheel mechanism is damaged in transit. If you’re staying in one place once you arrive, do you really need a suitcase at all? Put your clothes and other personal items in a sturdy box and you’ll pay ground shippers even less than the prices shown in our chart.

But even if the costs are the same airline vs. ground shipping, consider these advantages of shipping:

  • Better tracking: You can track your shipment online step by step. Try that with an airline.
  • Safer: There’s less chance of something going missing or getting damaged.
  • Convenience: you can breeze through the airport without waiting in line to check bags.
  • Responsibility: If an airline loses or delays your bag, they’ll keep your fee and play the blame game. FedEx and UPS will at least refund your shipping fees. Plus, airlines refuse to take responsibility for losing or damaging anything they consider “valuable,” such as electronics or business items. You can insure these items with the shipping services for a small additional fee.
  • Less schlepping: True, you have to either drop off your shipment at a post office, UPS office or store, or FedEx or Kinko’s location (or you can arrange for pick up for a small fee in some cases), but let’s face it: fighting for overhead space is no fun, and lugging luggage through mile-long airport concourses is no fun either.

Clearly, we’ve only given examples for domestic shipping, but USPS Priority Mail rates for international shipping are surprisingly competitive with the airlines’ fees for checking bags on international routes.

And even if you’re the carry-on type, shipping on your next trip may reveal the joys of not fighting for overhead space and saving yourself a shoulder injury from hoisting a heavy bag into same.

Give shipping vs. checking a try next time you fly. You may never pay bag fees again.

George Hobica is the founder of Airfarewatchdog™, the most inclusive source of airfare deals that have been researched and verified by experts. Airfarewatchdog compares fares from all airlines and includes the increasing number of airline-site-only and promo code fares.

Passengers left without luggage because of airlines refusal to pay overtime

Oh how the mighty have fallen. A decade ago, British Airways referred to itself as “the world’s favorite airline”. Now, they are quickly becoming the world’s worst.

After their planned strike was canceled, it became obvious that staff morale was at an all time low – something that became painfully obvious last Friday night at London Heathrow. A flight arriving from Prague got into the airport over an hour late, mainly due to the bad London weather.

Sadly, the baggage handling team at terminal 5 reached the end of their work day, and nobody at British Airways was willing to authorize overtime pay. End result — luggage stays on the plane, and the staff all go home.

Passengers had to wait for hours till the morning crew arrived at the airport. Some of these customers had been stuck at the airport for almost 6 hours. Of course, British Airways blamed everything on the bad weather, and apologized for the situation. Sadly, this is the same airline that once left 100’s of bags out in the rain, so they have a pretty nasty history in dealing with luggage.

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Airport baggage thief admits to stealing over 600 bags

Yikes. Turns out not all baggage thieves are sophisticated criminals.

Dallas police just arrested 39 year old Patrick Brown who was stealing up to 3 bags a day from Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston and Tulsa airports.

He’d wait at the carousel, then when bags circled once or twice, he’d snag them and leave the airport.

In total, he stole over 400 bags from DFW, 200 from Houston and an unknown number from Tulsa. Brown stored the bags in a storage unit, and sold them at a local Dallas flea market.

A buyer at the flea market discovered a name tag in the luggage, contacted the rightful owner, and the police got involved. So, if you passed through any of those airports, and you thought your bags never made it to the carousel, you may want to contact Dallas police.

Nio – using the power of Bluetooth to protect your belongings

On a weekly basis I probably read about 100 new product announcements, but every now and then I run into something that grabs my attention. Nio is such a product.

Nio is a Bluetooth enabled, motion sensing alarm tag.

The device attaches to your belongings, and when combined with the included software, can trigger an alarm if it moves outside a predetermined radius (up to 20 meters).

The Nio tag has an internal rechargeable battery capable of powering the device for several weeks.

To use the tag, you simply install the Nio software on your mobile device, versions are available for most Blackberry and Windows Mobile devices as well as most phones that can run Java applications.

Once installed, your phone will be in constant contact with the tag, and an audible alert will sound on your phone and on the tag if it moves out of range.

The software is pretty smart – you can setup specific times of day you want to enable (or disable) the alarm, which is perfect if you only want protection during your commute. In addition to this, the software can keep track of multiple tags, and can activate a “find me” function on the tag – which is a heck of a lot more advanced than those old “whistle to find” key tags.

Nio should start shipping in April, no price has been released yet but I’ll be sure to bring you a full review of the product as soon as it become available.