Taking Ski's / Snowboards on a plane?
Discussion
Having just got back from a fantastic weeks boarding in Switzerland I thought I better just share a few words of warning for any skiers / boarders out there intending to transport your own ski’s and boards via a budget airline.
If you do not have confirmation of your ski carriage yet pester, prod and annoy until you get it!
We flew with a well known ‘budget’ airline from Southampton and were appalled to find that our ski bags had not been booked on the flight, despite numerous confirmation calls by my wife. After much discussion all the airline would offer was to put our baggage on ‘stand-by’ and they would then inform us if they could take them about 5mins before take off.
Needless to say this was not a great start to our hols, after all what would you do on a ski holiday without your skis?
Luckily for us they took them but I fear for anyone travelling that has the standard ‘budget airline’ confirmation and cannot prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that their bags are booked on.
Having spoken to other passengers it seemed we were not alone in this scenario, a few other couples had been told the same thing as us, despite having booked their bags on as well. Others had been given a completely different story i.e. bags were booked but all ski baggage was on a ‘first come first served’ basis so if you didn’t turn up early you didn’t stand much of a chance.
All we could deduce from this treatment is that these airlines deliberately avoid giving out baggage confirmation if they have not sold all the seats on the plane, as a seat sold at the last minute will realise more cash than the £30 they receive to transport a board bag.
Obviously what they consider to be acceptable business practice but not much good if you are expecting to take your ski's with you – two of our party were all set to get off the plane and drive down to Switzerland with all our luggage as the airline could not guarantee that if the boards didn’t get on that flight that they would make the next days flight either (and they were no more flights for a week).
Anyway getting to the point, be careful out there and make sure you have everything in writing before you fly.
Matt
If you do not have confirmation of your ski carriage yet pester, prod and annoy until you get it!
We flew with a well known ‘budget’ airline from Southampton and were appalled to find that our ski bags had not been booked on the flight, despite numerous confirmation calls by my wife. After much discussion all the airline would offer was to put our baggage on ‘stand-by’ and they would then inform us if they could take them about 5mins before take off.
Needless to say this was not a great start to our hols, after all what would you do on a ski holiday without your skis?
Luckily for us they took them but I fear for anyone travelling that has the standard ‘budget airline’ confirmation and cannot prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that their bags are booked on.
Having spoken to other passengers it seemed we were not alone in this scenario, a few other couples had been told the same thing as us, despite having booked their bags on as well. Others had been given a completely different story i.e. bags were booked but all ski baggage was on a ‘first come first served’ basis so if you didn’t turn up early you didn’t stand much of a chance.
All we could deduce from this treatment is that these airlines deliberately avoid giving out baggage confirmation if they have not sold all the seats on the plane, as a seat sold at the last minute will realise more cash than the £30 they receive to transport a board bag.
Obviously what they consider to be acceptable business practice but not much good if you are expecting to take your ski's with you – two of our party were all set to get off the plane and drive down to Switzerland with all our luggage as the airline could not guarantee that if the boards didn’t get on that flight that they would make the next days flight either (and they were no more flights for a week).
Anyway getting to the point, be careful out there and make sure you have everything in writing before you fly.
Matt
What type of aircraft was it?
This sounds like a payload restriction issue when they will only load excess baggage after pax numbers have been confirmed.
Not sure how it works in the budget world but that can be the case with scheduled airlines as well if they are carrying a lot of cargo or facing strong headwinds etc
This sounds like a payload restriction issue when they will only load excess baggage after pax numbers have been confirmed.
Not sure how it works in the budget world but that can be the case with scheduled airlines as well if they are carrying a lot of cargo or facing strong headwinds etc
Haha.. this is the new world order with the advent of Lo-Co's (low cost). Due to idiots like O'leary every thing is being trimmed to the bone. Managment by fear and threats so the staff can never make a common sense decision.
This is what you get when the great unwashed see their £5.99 airline tickets as a birthright. Obvoiusly airline tickets were too expensive before but now the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction with companys giving NO customer service whatsoever as they are only a cattle-freighter and dont give a rats ass about you the customer.
I cant wait for the new "passenger rights" charter to come into effect, that will soon kill off a couple of the LoCos and we hopefully will find a happy medium with adequate customer service and balanced pricing..
You gets what you pays for..
This is what you get when the great unwashed see their £5.99 airline tickets as a birthright. Obvoiusly airline tickets were too expensive before but now the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction with companys giving NO customer service whatsoever as they are only a cattle-freighter and dont give a rats ass about you the customer.
I cant wait for the new "passenger rights" charter to come into effect, that will soon kill off a couple of the LoCos and we hopefully will find a happy medium with adequate customer service and balanced pricing..
You gets what you pays for..
alfaman said:I am glad you said that - given I booked my February skiing trip with EasyJet last week! I was awaiting a reply re. the "Southampton carrier" before asking if anyone had used EasyJet to carry ski's this season.
I've never had a problem :
EasyJet have a free 10kg sports kit allowance (inc skis)
LRdriver II said:
You gets what you pays for..
Fair point and I do agree with you - what pi$$es me off is that we had paid in advance for the board bags but due to another error on their part (they charged my CC £3,5K for someone else's flights) they agreed to refund the bag transport costs, I didn’t realise that ‘refund’ meant ‘we just won’t take them’!
Also forgot to mention, on the flight back we sat on the tarmac at Geneva for well over an hour waiting for them to sort out luggage problems – they moved a fair bit from the back to the front but then still messed around for about another 40mins. When we finally took off the people behind us asked if any luggage had been taken off as they thought they had seen a luggage cart speeding away from the plane just before take off, the stewardess replied ‘oh they took off some bags for two people who decided not to fly today, as far as I know all other bags are on’.
Back in Southampton we discover that 17 peoples ski bags had been removed! And I know that the Stewardess knew because I saw her talking to the ground staff and the captain about 2mins before take-off – I think she was just after an easy life, but it just makes my blood boil at the barefaced cheek of it all.
What makes me laugh is that the customer service desk has a big sign saying something along the lines of ‘Do not shout, swear, or abuse our staff or we will have you removed from the airport’. Well stop treating your customers like cr@p and then hiding behind your front-line staff and they won’t keep getting abuse!!
Funnily enough they only run this route in the winter for the ski market, not going to last that long is it if they keep treating their seasonal passengers like this.
Sorry for the rant it just winds me up they think they can continue to run a service like this and get away with it.
CharlieAlpha66 said:
I've never had a problem :
EasyJet have a free 10kg sports kit allowance (inc skis)
I am glad you said that - given I booked my February skiing trip with EasyJet last week! I was awaiting a reply re. the "Southampton carrier" before asking if anyone had used EasyJet to carry ski's this season.
I've not used them this season but they have always previously allowed me up to a total of 30kg plus carryon - a very "sports kit " friendly airline.
clapham993 said:WHAT TOTAL RUBBISH.
The answer is simple: don't fly budget.
I flew twice weekly with our very own national carrier for 2.5 years - and the degree of things they f
d up by me would fill a novel (of the horror variety). Airlines are all as bad as each other - you just take your chances.
Recently I flew with a new budget outfit - Whizz Air - from Luton to Budapest... and could not fault them.
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