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Epidemic of Lost Bags Plagues Air Travelers

By Dan Schlossberg
ConsumerAffairs.com

August 2, 2006

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Nobody likes to be left holding the bag on their vacation. But airlines do it 10,000 times a day, according to statistics from the U.S. Dept. of Transportation.

That was the average daily number of passenger luggage lost in 2005 -- the worst year for lost bags since 1990 and a 23 per cent increase over 2004.

For the year, the total number of lost bags soared to 30 million � a mind-boggling number but not so bad when matched against the total number of checked bags: 3.7 billion (with a "b").

The bottom line, at least from the airlines' perspective, is that 99 per cent of checked bags were handled correctly.

But that remaining 1 per cent forced airlines to spend $2.5 billion (with a "b") returning lost bags to owners or compensating them for bags that were never found (240,000 in 2005).

The main reasons for lost bags haven�t changed much over the years:
• Luggage lost during transfer from one flight to another;
• Bags not placed on the proper plane by airlines;
• Security delays, passenger mistakes, or ticketing errors.

Taking nonstop flights significantly reduces the chances of losing luggage, since more than six of every ten lost-bag complaints involve transfer from one plane to another. Among possible causes are tight connections, late arrivals, distance between terminals, and overcrowded baggage compartments. Packed planes equals packed luggage bins -- not only inside the cabin but underneath.

Most mishandled bags are eventually reunited with their owners, although the time involved often seems like an eternity. The average wait is 31 hours -- forcing difficult decisions on both business and vacation travelers who don�t know whether to shop for new clothes or sit and wait.

Airlines are certainly concerned with the magnitude of the problem. Reducing the number of lost bags would not only help protect the already-shaky passenger conception of carriers but would significantly reduce costs.

In 2004, the lost-luggage problem cost $1.6 billion -- almost a billion dollars less than it did a year later.

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