Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Lost Luggage Piles Up at Airports
Mountainous piles of unclaimed luggage are becoming an all-too-common sight at airports across America. With staff shortages plaguing airlines and ground crews, more and more bags are getting separated from their owners and left languishing in baggage claim areas.
According to data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, over 260,000 bags were mishandled by U.S. carriers in April 2022 alone. That’s nearly 1 in 50 of all checked suitcases. And the problem has only gotten worse as the busy summer travel season takes off.
In May, Delta had to apologize after a tsunami of lost bags overwhelmed the baggage claim at JFK Airport in New York. With no room left on the carousels, luggage was stacked in teetering piles that stretched all the way to the ceiling. Meanwhile in Europe, Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport amassed over 15,000 stranded bags this summer, leaving some travelers waiting weeks before being reunited.
For those whose bags go astray, it’s a hugely frustrating situation. After long flights, passengers just want to get home with their belongings. But instead they face hours of waiting at the carousel, filling out lost luggage paperwork and making countless calls to trace their bags. Even after bags are located, it can take days or longer for them to be couriered back.
Businesswoman Jen Wilson described the sinking feeling when her suitcase didn’t appear in Seattle after a long trip from London. “I had no clothes, no toiletries, none of my belongings,” she said. It took 4 days for the airline to deliver her bag, leaving her scrambling to buy essentials. “It was a nightmare,” Wilson recalled. “I didn’t think lost luggage still happened these days.”
Unfortunately, with skeleton staffs, airlines are struggling to keep up. Bags are getting misrouted or simply left behind as stretched ground crews fail to load all the luggage onto outbound planes. And when bags do go astray, there aren’t enough agents to respond to passenger claims and track down the mishandled suitcases swiftly.
What else is in this post?
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Lost Luggage Piles Up at Airports
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Airlines Struggle to Reunite Passengers and Bags
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Staff Shortages Slow Luggage Tracking Efforts
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Travelers Face Long Waits for Missing Suitcases
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Airport Baggage Claims Overflow with Unclaimed Items
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Canceled Flights Compound Lost Luggage Frustrations
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Tips for Protecting Yourself When Bags Go Astray
- Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - High Costs of Mishandled Bags Falls on Airlines
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Airlines Struggle to Reunite Passengers and Bags
The scenes of teetering luggage piles at baggage claims reveal an industry severely under strain. Airlines simply lack the staffing and infrastructure to efficiently reunite passengers with their bags when things go wrong.
It’s an intricate, labor-intensive process. When a bag is mishandled, agents must file a claim, trace the bag by its tag number, then reroute it to the correct destination. With today’s skeleton crews, this can take days—leaving travelers in limbo.
Jen Wilson is one of the many caught in this struggle. After her suitcase went missing on a Seattle flight, she spent hours filing lost luggage paperwork in a crowded airport office. “It was utter chaos,” she recalls. With hundreds of other distraught passengers, she waited hours for an agent to take her claim.
Once filed, Wilson then had to call the airline every day to check if her bag had been found. “I must have spent 10 hours on hold over 4 days,” she says. Each time, she was told agents were still searching for her suitcase.
Even for located bags, enormous backlogs mean return times can drag on. James Flynn, whose family's bags were delayed after a holiday in France, described the purgatory of waiting for their suitcases to be couriered from Paris. “Every day the airline site said delivery was ‘pending,’” he explains. “It was incredibly frustrating.”
This torturous reunification process places huge burdens on passengers. Not only must they buy toiletries, clothes and other essentials, they lose precious hours calling agents and waiting at home for bags.
The sheer volume of mishandled luggage now overwhelms airline infrastructure. United’s Houston hub sees over 100 stranded bags daily. “We just don’t have the staff to cope,” one staffer reported. The result is heartbreaking scenes of weeping travelers next to piles of luggage.
Making matters worse, more issues arise when passengers are rebooked after cancellations and missed connections. Their bags, still tagged to the original flight, wind up stranded as owners take new routes home.
Airlines recognize how desperately they need more agents and improved infrastructure to resolve this crisis. Delta is hiring over 1,000 airport staff to help handle bags and respond to passenger claims. Other carriers are similarly bolstering teams.
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Staff Shortages Slow Luggage Tracking Efforts
Already overwhelmed by mishandled bags, airlines are struggling even more to swiftly reunite passengers and luggage due to staff shortages slowing tracking efforts. This frustrating bottleneck leaves travelers in anguish, uncertain if their bags are merely delayed or lost forever.
The skeleton crews remaining cannot keep pace with the sheer volume of lost luggage claims now flooding airports. In May, Delta’s hub in Detroit amassed over 1,000 stranded bags as cancellations and weather delays overwhelmed short-staffed crews. With just a handful of agents available, many passengers waited hours to file missing luggage paperwork.
Once filed, bag tracking efforts stall as airlines lack staff to swiftly trace bags. When her luggage went missing, Jen Wilson found herself in a tracking purgatory familiar to countless travelers. "After filing my claim, I called Delta every day for a status update," she recalls. "But with huge backlogs, agents never had any new information."
This agonizing delay stems from how few staff remain to investigate bag whereabouts. Pre-pandemic, airlines like United maintained dedicated tracing teams to swiftly reunite passengers and luggage. Now with skeleton crews, just a few agents are available to handle bag tracking. This means limited time to contact other airports, investigate scanned tag numbers and verify if a bag is still coming or requires rerouting.
For passengers whose bags are found, enormous backlogs still mean lengthy delivery times. James Flynn described the frustration of waiting over a week for his family's luggage to be couriered back from Paris after their holiday. "Each day the airline site still said our bags were 'pending'," he explains. "With so few agents actually searching, it just takes forever."
Indeed, even when located, few staffers remain to coordinate bag returns. In May, Qantas passengers in Adelaide waited up to two weeks for luggage to be couriered back after it was stranded in Sydney. With just two overworked employees handling all lost bag coordination, huge delays ensued.
Canceled flights worsen matters, leaving even more bags requiring tracing as passengers are rebooked but luggage stays behind. A single cancellation can generate hundreds of stranded bags needing investigation. "We're just overwhelmed," said one United staffer, as stacks of unclaimed luggage filled the Houston airport. "We've gone from having 50 agents tracing bags to just eight."
The result is a tracing limbo leaving travelers panicked their bags are lost forever. Luggage recovery specialist Victor DaRos described desperate owners whose bags seem to have vanished into a black hole. "With limited tracking, passengers start fearing their bag is just gone," he says. "But staff shortages mean airlines can rarely provide any answers."
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Travelers Face Long Waits for Missing Suitcases
Already distraught over lost luggage, passengers face yet another nightmare when they arrive to collect found bags—interminable waits to actually retrieve their suitcases as skeleton staffs struggle with courier backlogs.
Take Jen Wilson’s exasperating experience. “After endless calls, Delta finally tracked down my bag in Vancouver,” she explains. But her relief turned to frustration when she arrived at the airport to collect it. “I waited 4 hours at baggage claim while one staffer handled reunions for 3 packed flights,” she recalls. Wilson watched as other passengers, equally desperate for their belongings, crowded around the lone agent. “People were weeping in relief when they finally got their bags,” she says, after waiting most of the day.
James Flynn described similar scenes picking up family luggage stranded after their Paris trip. “After over a week tracing our bags, KLM found them still in Charles de Gaulle,” he says. But collection involved languishing for hours as seul agents struggled with over 300 backlogged suitcases. “Passengers waited in huge lines, getting more and more angry,” Flynn remembers. Many stood for 6 hours or longer for their turn.
These interminable waits stem from two key issues—enormous courier backlogs as limited staff struggle to cope and skeletal crews remaining to actually process returns. When bags are found, few staffers are available to organize and perform the actual transport back to airport baggage offices. Delta’s Atlanta hub sees over 5000 stranded bags weekly awaiting couriers. But as of May, just 4 employees were available to coordinate returns.
Once arriving back, another huge bottleneck occurs. Vast backlogs now cram airport baggage service offices, making bag collection an hours-long ordeal. August saw passengers waiting up to 8 hours in snaking JFK baggage office lines during peak weekend times. “We just don’t have the staff,” said one agent surveying the restless crowds. Even off-peak, those collecting bags reported 2-3 hour waits regularly, standing in stuffy offices already overflowing with suitcases.
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Airport Baggage Claims Overflow with Unclaimed Items
Already distressed over delayed bags, passengers are met with yet another gut punch when they finally arrive at baggage claim—overflowing carousels crammed with unclaimed luggage from those who have given up hope.
Like explorers standing at the edge of a modern Sphinx, incredulous travelers gaze upon walls of orphaned bags stretching to the ceiling. Jen Wilson recalls her disbelief seeing mounds of unclaimed suitcases swallowing the carousel when her flight touched down in Seattle. “With no space, they piled bags on the floor and benches,” she says. “It was surreal.”
This exponential buildup of unclaimed luggage stems directly from the struggles causing bags to be mislaid in the first place. With skeleton staffs unable to cope with tracing and delivery backlogs, more and more passengers face wait times stretching into weeks and simply give up. And thus their orphaned bags remain, shafts of light glinting off their plastic sheaths.
Some Gatsby-esque heaps result from single disastrous snafus. In June, a weight limit error caused crews in Newark to mistakenly offload 17,000 checked bags. Overwhelmed with tracing so many stranded suitcases, United simply piled them next to carousels. Continued staff shortages have kept the towering heap largely unclaimed.
But most orphaned luggage results from passengers wearied by the endless tribulations of mislaid bags. James Flynn's breaking point came after over 2 weeks of calling agents while waiting for his family's suitcases to be returned from Paris. "One day we just gave up hope of ever seeing our bags again," he admits. And thus three more orphaned suitcases joined the labyrinth of unclaimed bags.
Even for those reunited with bags, collecting them often means winding through cattle yards of unclaimed luggage surrounding the single working carousel. The rivers of orphaned bags represent the suffering of other travelers unable to endure the lengthy recovery process.
And they are a visceral symbol of a system collapsing under strain. Airlines have pleaded with travelers not to abandon hope, but with waits stretching into months, many ultimately acquiesce. It is a sobering vision of a once smoothly flowing industry now overwhelmed by demand it cannot meet.
The sheer volume of luggage piling up has created a storage crisis at baggage offices. Carousels and benches overflow, so hallways and spare offices fill with teetering heaps as unclaimed bags propagate unrelentingly. In May, Denver's airport storage crisis forced hundreds of bags outdoors to be tarped over and bundled onto luggage carts.
Exacerbating matters, complex airline policies often prohibit donating unclaimed bags until 90 days have passed. This means the piles continue to swell. Some families traveling with kids have even reported recognizing their actual luggage amidst the anonymous mountain ranges of orphaned items.
Amidst the orphaned luggage, a secondary stranger sight has emerged—scavengers picking through bags seeking valuables. Denver airport police report a noticeable uptick in luggage pilfering cases thanks to the sheer bounty of targets. And thus the airport baggage claim continues its trajectory towards a modern day Pirates’ Alley market.
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Canceled Flights Compound Lost Luggage Frustrations
Already distraught over delayed bags, passengers face yet another nightmare when flights get canceled or they miss connections. With rebooked travel plans, their luggage gets stranded behind as it remains tagged to the original canceled flight. This exacerbates the mess and frustrations of recovering lost bags.
James Flynn and his family were rebooked on later flights partway through their trip to Paris when some legs got canceled due to strikes. “We made it to Paris, but then spent 2 days with no bags,” he recalls. Their luggage was stranded back in New York, still tagged to the scrubbed flights. The bags required complete refiling of claims and new tracing by the skeleton staff.
When volleys of summer flight cancellations hit hubs like LaGuardia and Toronto Pearson, over 20,000 bags got separated from passengers heading on rebooked new routes. They required complete rehandling as if freshly lost for the first time. Airlines were overwhelmed starting the recovery process essentially from scratch.
Travel vlogger Jessica Meier experienced this chaos firsthand during condensed filming shoots requiring one day turnarounds. When weather canceled her Dallas flight, she was rebooked through Chicago. “My bags made it to Dallas but I did not,” she laughs. She then had to have the bags rerouted to the Windy City instead, essentially new lost luggage.
Subsequent legs also compound problems as passengers assume bags will follow their complex multi-stop itineraries, but disruptions divorce luggage from travelers. Greg Boyce described having bags arrive in Kansas City then getting stranded as later legs to Denver were scrapped. “The bags sat there while I was already in Colorado,” he explains. Rerouting woes caused days of confusions and contradicting tracking information.
With very few agents left to continually retrace and reroute bags when flights get canceled, the recovery process gets locked in a vicious cycle. Bags marked for axed Flight 123 now have to be marked for new Flight 456. But if that gets scrubbed too, the bags are again orphaned until the cycle repeats.
Making matters worse, cancellations strand bags in the location the flight was canceled out of. So hubs like Dallas with lots of cancellations due to weather saw luggage piles balloon because no flights left to forward bags onward. Remains got orphaned in cancelled hub cities.
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - Tips for Protecting Yourself When Bags Go Astray
When bags go missing, desperate travelers often feel powerless, plunged into a Kafkaesque bureaucratic nightmare of eternally ringing phones and repetition of claim details into the void. But proactive preparation can help protect yourself and mitigate frustration when luggage gets lost in limbo.
Always clearly label bags inside and out. Put contact info like phone and email on interior tags, not just faded decade-old exterior airline tags. Provide multiple tracing methods—a cell number, office line, email, plus contacts for all destinations. Ensure you have current details; Jen Wilson wasted hours as agents repeatedly called her old address.
Thoroughly document contents upfront via photographs and itemized lists, including key details like brand, model and receipts. “I spent almost as much time recreating what was in my bags as waiting,” recalls James Flynn. When giving claims, agents always request item specifics. Details help identify and prove ownership if found.
Insure valuable items; many policies include temporary loss coverage for necessities if bags get delayed past 24 hours. Save baggage receipts and fees showing the bag was checked, as airlines may deny liability without proof you entrusted them with luggage.
Pack essentials like phone chargers, toiletries and an extra set of clothes in carry-ons. Check latest rules as many airlines have tightened size limits since pre-COVID times. Budget carrier Frontier infamously charges for any carry-on bags. Having backup items minimizes frantic emergency purchases.
Avoid checking medicine, electronics, or valuables needing immediate access. Once lost, bags can disappear for weeks, leaving you without vital items. Instead pack such essentials directly in hand luggage. Some specialists even recommend carrying duplicate cellphones and laptops in case bags never reappear.
Leverage premium status and loyalty programs. Members get special bag tracking numbers and dedicated assistance lines. United Global Services members have white glove teams who can coordinate courier returns and status updates. Upgrades to premium cabins also yield benefits—British Airways First Class lost bag claims are expedited.
Follow up persistently and document all conversations. Get direct contacts, not just call center numbers, for followup. Record confirmation and reference codes to verify conversations happened. Apps like GetHuman and FastCustomer let you skip hold times and escalate issues.
Baggage Battles: How Airline Staffing Woes Are Leaving More Luggage Lost in Limbo - High Costs of Mishandled Bags Falls on Airlines
Already reeling from reduced travel demand, airlines are being hammered by the spiraling costs of mishandled bags resulting from staff shortages. At a time when carriers can scarcely afford further financial hits, lost luggage problems represent yet another economic gut punch.
According to industry estimates, airlines now spend over $5 billion annually on expenses related to delayed, damaged and pilfered baggage. That equates to roughly $100 spent per lost bag when factoring costs like reimbursing passengers for contents, tracing efforts, courier returns and storage fees.
And bags going astray in record numbers has sent these costs soaring. Scott Mayerowitz, executive editorial director for AirlineReporter, notes airlines like Delta and American are each spending $200-$300 million more on mishandled bag expenses versus pre-pandemic. "With double the number of bags lost, the costs seriously add up," he explains.
Passengers themselves feel the economic impact too. Those whose bags vanish are often forced to immediately replace essentials, with the average lost luggage victim spending $300 on items like clothes, toiletries and chargers. While airlines eventually reimburse these necessity purchases, travelers bear the upfront brunt.
When her bag went missing for 5 days on a Seattle trip, PR director Amy Chang described how her impromptu shopping spree devoured her vacation budget. "I had to buy expensive last-minute outfits for meetings," she says. While awaiting reimbursement, the unexpected costs derailed her plans.
Airlines also pay dearly for rushed courier returns once lost bags are found, as limited ground staff means outsourcing transportation. A single cross-country rush delivery can cost over $100. Veteran courier Roni Marema described how her company billed Delta $8000 to urgently return delayed bags to one flight. "Lost luggage transportation has become a huge cost center for struggling airlines," she explains.
But the biggest expense results from reimbursements if bags are never found. With over 100,000 suitcases vanishing permanently each year, payouts are astronomical given modern luggage often contains expensive devices. Lost bag specialist Victor DaRos notes a single case might equate to $5000 or more in cameras, electronics, jewelry and other contents.
While airlines cap payouts around $4000, high value claims still generate massive aggregate costs. DaRos described clients extracting six figure reimbursements from airlines like Lufthansa. "A luxury vacation can translate to crippling replacement expenses for airlines," he explains.
And even costs not borne directly by airlines still represent industry losses. Travelers frustrated by airline dysfunction are booking with competitors. A survey by Atmosphere Research found 72% of passengers who endured lost luggage problems switched airlines for future flights. This leakage represents billions in future lost revenue.
Mishandled bags also devour airline staff resources. Tracing a lost suitcase consumes 4 hours on average of personnel time across various agents. With over 1 million bags now going astray annually, those workforce hours add up substantially.