Baggage policies need reality check
TWO brief baggage-handling stories: Returning from Chicago to LAX in early November, I tried to re-route myself when my scheduled flight showed multiple delays. Another LAX-bound flight had an available seat. I was not allowed to change my reservation.
The airline’s agent told me that the Transportation Security Administration would not allow my already checked baggage to go on a different flight. When I pointed out that my baggage had to be waiting because the flight had not happened, the agent laughed and told me to take it up with the TSA. I was made to wait five hours for my re-scheduled flight -- as other Los Angeles flights departed on time. My baggage was waiting at LAX when I arrived.
About 10 years ago (also in Chicago), I mistakenly took another passenger’s metal case -- which I confused with our film crew’s 10 or so cases of gear. Discovering my mistake, I immediately called the carrier. Their representative yelled at me and threatened me with arrest if I did not immediately leave the hotel and return to the airport with the other passenger’s case (at midnight).
Not the most positive way to encourage rectifying an honest error.
SUE SMITH
Hollywood
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