Now how much can you realistically expect to be compensated for lost luggage?
Our advice? Don't settle for anything less than, say $1,500.
Our advice? Don't settle for anything less than, say $1,500.
Luggage carousel anxiety is perfectly logical when you consider that quite a few pieces of luggage get lost each year.
Think long and hard before you pack that bag because article 22 of the the Montreal Convention establishes a maximum value per luggage lost. So if you load up with $10,000 in cash -- the international maximum -- and pop it in your luggage, you can be screwed because you'll only be getting about 20% of that back if it gets lost: better jam your valuables on the carry-on.
Not all countries have signed onto the Montreal Convention, so in some rare cases you might luck out and get more. For example one family from Verdun sued British Airways four years ago for a lost piece of luggage on their way to Cambodia. British Airways noted that the limit for such a loss was, in October 2008, $1,759.
But the judge noted that Cambodia hadn't signed the agreement, so he awarded the plaintiffs $5,584.
Not all countries have signed onto the Montreal Convention, so in some rare cases you might luck out and get more. For example one family from Verdun sued British Airways four years ago for a lost piece of luggage on their way to Cambodia. British Airways noted that the limit for such a loss was, in October 2008, $1,759.
But the judge noted that Cambodia hadn't signed the agreement, so he awarded the plaintiffs $5,584.
Fabiano Chagas and Camilla Chagas of Brossard recently also argued that their international flight to Brazil didn't fall under the conditions of the Montreal Convention, they sued for $7,000, a sum which included the value of their lost bag, which they pegged at over $5,000 The judge didn't buy their arguments that the convention didn't apply and awarded them the $1,736.
Sophie Bouchard similarly shot for the $7,000 (a sum you see a lot because it's the maximum for small claims court) from American Airlines for lost luggage on flights to Las Vegas, but she walked away with $1,547.
In 2011 Yvette Gartner had her bag lost on an Air Canada flight to California, which she said had $7,200 worth of stuff in it. A judge awarded her $1,500. Mohammed Ouali, won a settlement of $1,693 for his bag, lost by Air Algeria.
So if they lose your bag, aim for that $1,500-$1,8000 zone when compensation negotiations start.
10 comments:
The amount that one claims, should be based on the actual value of the contents of the bag, not on how much they can "get away with"!
Karma. Scam the system and you will get scammed. Have a little more self-respect!
Onkel Charlie
I guess "Anonymous" has never lost luggage. Good Old Onkel Charlie.
Having lost luggage before with Air Canada I can feel one's pain. When I arrived at my destination my bag didn't arrive.. I was issued a 500$ voucher to purchase what I needed and would have to wait for my bags to arrive (You'll only get this if you are in a different city, If you live in Montreal and arrive with missing luggage SOL). Sadly I departed my destination without my bags.. Air Canada opened a claim file and offered me 1800$ for my lost bag after about 3 weeks. I got a check in the mail in about 5 days after settling.
For future advice you must carry on all electronic devices that have batteries, so good luck claiming a laptop or camera that got lost in checked luggage.
I've dealt with AC, AA, BA, UA and B6 with lost/ missing bags. Now my flying is done with carry on's period. Worst case you gate check the bag in the jetway and it's losded in the hold.
"Laauriate": nope, never lost luggaGe. But if/when I do, I will claim the actual value of the contents, as opposed to lyng in order to extract more than what I am due!
Ol' Charlie is a lot of things, but scammer ain't one of 'em.
Onkel Charlie.
Our entire belongings ended up somewhere like Timbuktu in 67 during another of Dad's sabbaticals-this one 6 months in the U.S. Thus I had nought to wear but an itchy public girls UK uniform-look it up-almost excuses why I was constantly beaten up until we left. Luggage returned one month after we came back to U.K.
When we came to Canada, much later, antique furniture was packed in corrugated cardboard that ruin all surfaces. My late Mother was an Antique Dealer and for once, was speechless.
I have been taking 30-40 flights a year for the last 15 years or so and have never lost a bag. This includes flying to places like El Salvador, Panama, Chile etc. There have been many times when the bag was not on the carrousel but it has always turned up within a day or two.
Not sure if I have been particularly lucky or if the whole lost bag thing is a little overblown.
Not precisely about luggage, but something similar from 40-odd years ago: It used to be that cargo carriers (ships and planes) had a maximun $500 per package liability. Until they could no longer get away with it, steamship lines defined a shipping container as one package, even those big 40 footers you see being hauled on semis along the Ville Marie.
So if a company like (say) Toshiba lost a container full of TV sets, the shipping line would just say, "Fine, here's your $500, take a hike." Or anyway, so it was told to me by our marine insurance broker. Thing was, that Toshiba would say "there were 250 boxes of TVs in that container", and claim $25,000 from their insurers, who would have to pay up.
The insurers got $500 (one container) from the steamship line. My guy told me that it was simply amazing how many of the "less than 100% kosher" lines ran into "rough seas" somewhere around the Philippines, resulting in a container or two being "jettisoned" putatively for the safety of the ship. Of course they had just pulled into a secluded port, and offloaded a couple and sold them, and thus trivialities like crew wages were covered.
Insurance underwriters, faced with the shipping lines refusal to budge on the $500 per container while they had to pay out thousands, started charging an enormously higher premium for cargo stored in containers on or above the ship deck, those being the easiest to steal.
Finally, the insurers told the shipping lines "There's no such thing as coverage for the ship itself anymore. If one of your sinks, or runs aground creating some massive oil spill or damage liability, it's tough luck for you this time, whatever it costs comes out of your pockets, not ours. Just imagine if Carnival had to pay for their drunken captain's stupidity themselves- the ship alone cost over $500million, plus there's liabilities to the estates of those who died and so on.
Steamship lines need insurance. And importers need it to, because stuff happens all the time. After a few disasters, the lines capitulated, and redefined "package" as a box or bale inside a container. I have no idea what the maximum payout is today, but it's no doubt jumped much like luggage. As I recall, the compensation for lost luggage back in the 70's was something like $200-$250. Travelers probably would have been ecstatic to get the money you're talking about today.
Anyways, just one of my little geezerdotes. I got a ton of them.
It's just your tough luck that I stumbled on this blog a few years back, and your fault for making the thing so interesting.
Unless you sue, you will be very lucky to get lots of money. The one time an American airline lost my suitcase, they said their policy is a fixed price per pound, and because the max weight is 50 pounds, its basically a fixed amount like 50 times 10$. You can't prove what was inside. Scammers could say it was filled with gold bars when it was just filled with dirty clothes...
I'm not a big air traveler anymore, I've really disliked it since some time in the late 80's, when it became the equivalent of the 55 bus in rush hour on a humid day.
Although it's been about 30 years, I still remember the itinerary from one trip the guys I worked for back then took:
Montreal-New York
New York-London
London-Paris
Paris-Frankfurt
Frankfurt-Madrid
Madrid-Milan
Milan-Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv-Johannesburg
Johannesburg-Montevideo
Montevideo-Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires-Sao Paulo
Sao Paulo-Belem
Belem-New York
New York-Montreal
10 days.
As I recall, some of these stops, like Frankfurt and Milan, were little more than a cup of coffee in an airport, but then business needed a lot more face-to-face in those days.
This was just one of their usual 3-4 long trips a year.
You might say these guys were experienced travelers. One of them once told me: "Never take anything more than carry-on. Whatever you might want to bring that's oversize, you can do without it. Even buying a new suit costs less time and money than a meeting missed due to misplaced luggage."
"Only bring what you absolutely need. If you didn't bring it, you can't lose it."
"And TAP stands for "Take Another Plane. Good advice."
No doubt everyone knows the story of author Jerzy Kosinski's famously disrupted trip from Paris to Los Angeles. Sometimes misplaced luggage can be a good thing. A very good thing.
Only had luggage misplaced once upon arriving in Auckland, N.Z., but it was delivered to my hotel soon after I checked in.
Maybe that little kid is crying because he wanted to go for a ride on the luggage conveyor belt? ;-)
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