Hand Luggage with Thomas Cook

[hubblebubble]

t's & c's:

Please note, at some UK airports a charge for a Gate Bag will now be applied. This means if customers arrive at the boarding gate with more then one item of hand baggage (excluding airport shopping) the extra item/s will be taken and put into the hold. There is a fee of £40.00 per bag that will be charged.

[Scunner]

The hand baggage chaos was caused by the airlines themselves when they started charging for hold baggage - of course people are going to try and get by with hand baggage alone if possible. I never used to have hand baggage and now I am one of the people competing for overhead locker space which is quite obviously insufficient if everyone on the flight has hand baggage. There never used to be any problem finding space before they change the rules on hold baggage.

On a recent flight from Glasgow to Belfast (a ridiculously short journey, seatbelts on, seatbelts off, seatbelts back on   ) easyjet announced to the boarding queues that due to the amount of hand baggage, anyone who's baggage didn't fit in the cage would have it put in the hold and charged £40. Two minutes later they must have realised they had a serious problem, becuase they announced that they needed volunteers to have their hand baggage put in the hold for which there would be no charge.

But they caused this.

[Ray1951]

Hubblebubble said it too.  We just have to wait and see what transpires BUT let's face it, if there's a way to screw the travelling public then the carriers WILL find a way. We are already paying higher costs for flights because of the 'greed' factor of the carriers. We all want cheap flights to our favoured destinations but the only way we can be heard is to 'stand together' and where WE can hit them, then we should do so.

[Scunner]

How are you proposing to hit them? Everyone boycotting them is great until they are the cheapest then everyone walks off and leaves you standing alone  

[karen]

Past experience of TC has proven that they can make the rules up as they go along. I think i may have mentioned before when there were five of us traveling last yr and i had only booked  and paid luggage for three when we checked in i was a bit unsure if we were overweight and said  to the lad checking us in i was relieved they weren't, he replied there are five of you traveling 5 prs x 20kg = 100kg allowance "you are well under your allowance mrs rose". Open mouthed i pointed out no i only paid for three he said it wouldn't of mattered  the booking form reads 5 persons so i would allocate you 100kg. But would this happen again if the luggage was overweight...i think not!
I just think TC especially, try to sqeeze every penny possible out of us, i am not tight but i won't spend 1p more that nessercery with them. i do everything possible like take the children's juice bottles empty and ask witherspoons to fill them  with water when we have a drink there defore departing, take a sandwich on board (they probably stop that soon and i'll have to resort to eating a jar of baby food lol) and i wont buy there duty free either. i have had bad experiences with them in the past and there customer relations leaves a lot to be desired.

We are traveling with monarch in a couple of wks for the first time in a few yrs iam sure this will be an intersting experience...i keep you posted.

I haven't been with easyjet as they don't fly from brum so hoping this might be something to come in the future.

karen

[grizabella]

So,can you still have a small handbag plus your hand luggage??Or does you handbag count as your hand luggage??

[Scunner]

With easyjet and TC we have found that Mrs Scunner has to put her handbag in her hand luggage. Sometimes. Sometimes is it so important and sometimes they don't even mention it at all. When it is important, they hold up the queue at the gate while she opens her little case, forces it in, then struggles to zip it back up again. Then, once she reaches the plane, she takes it out again. We have even been told that a teddy bear being held by one of the girls would have to go into her hand baggage. What a ridiculous way to hold up a queue but once again, they cause it

[marina]

Think you'll find with most airlines that you can't have both - bag and handbag!  I usually do what Mrs Scunner has done and put a small handbag inside my hand luggage, then when on the plane the bag goes in overhead locker and handbag stays with me!

Crazy really.

[Ray1951]

Handbag IS classed a hand luggage BUT remember there are "jobs worth" peeps about.  Some will and some wont, you don't know until they nab you.

[karen]

Don't you just love em!

karen