Every day in the world 82,000 pieces of luggage are mislaid during air travel and above all never identified, which represents 30 million lost suitcases per year or nearly 1 piece of luggage per second (Sita report 2013). This is a major stress for travellers, who often find themselves quite helpless in this situation. If you do not see your suitcase arriving on the luggage conveyor belt, here is how to proceed to try to retrieve it and get compensation if it is permanently lost

What to do right away at the airport

As soon as you have noticed that your luggage has not arrived, go to the airport baggage service. This is a service that deals specifically with claims for lost or damaged baggage. You must then present your boarding pass and baggage receipt (to be kept in a safe place, usually glued to the back of your boarding pass) to one of the agents who will quickly conduct a search in order to locate your baggage. If he cannot locate it, he opens a "lost baggage" file and launches a search with the airline and at the airports of embarkation or transfer. It also registers your home/hotel address so that your luggage can be sent there as soon as it arrives. He then gives you a document with all the information about your lost baggage, to be kept for any claim or compensation. On the website of most airlines, it is now possible to know in real time if your suitcase has been delivered to the airport

Good to know

More often than not, when luggage gets lost, it is due to a too short connection between two flights, as baggage handlers do not have the time to move the suitcases from one plane to another. Suitcases are therefore often lost on Alitalia flights with a short connection to Rome or Milan if the transfer is an hour or less (source Alitalia). The luggage is actually stuck at the transfer airport and arrives a few days later.
However, in all cases, once the baggage service has located your baggage, it will be forwarded to your home/hotel at the company's expense. The average waiting time is 1 to 5 days

Your rights while waiting for your suitcase

The first aid kit

To help you out, the airline's baggage service provides you with a small kit with a toiletries kit and a t-shirt to sleep in. It's usually pretty spartan, but it's better than nothing. However, be sure to ask for this kit as officers are often overwhelmed and tend to forget to give it away

Compensation by the airline

As the airline is responsible for your luggage, it must compensate you in case of late delivery. But she won't advance you money for the purchases you'll have to make while you're waiting for your suitcase. It's up to you to buy what you need and keep the bills. You can then send them to the company's customer service department with a copy of the "lost baggage" document you were given at the baggage claim department, along with the boarding coupon. Be careful, the sum of your expenses per day is fixed and limited by the airline company. Remember to find out this amount as soon as you report the loss to the baggage department. However, the daily amount of this compensation is generally quite low, around 50 euros per day on average. You will therefore have to dress in basic clothes while waiting for your suitcase, and if you spend more, you can always ask the company for an exceptional commercial gesture. Please note, however, that all so-called "luxury" purchases, such as brand-name perfumes for example, will not be considered "necessities" and will therefore be non-refundable

Luggage insurance

If you purchased baggage insurance when you purchased your ticket, you can spend a lot more on clothing while waiting for your suitcase to be returned. Some insurances propose to compensate you up to 3000 euros in case of total loss of your luggage. These luggage insurances cost between 20 and 30 euros for a return ticket, so it may be worth taking out, especially if you are transporting valuables.

If you purchased your ticket with an American Express Gold, Visa Premier or Gold Mastercard, you are entitled to compensation from a few hours of baggage delay. This insurance is offered with the purchase of these cards. To find out the limit of this compensation, call your card's insurance department. As an indication, if you paid for your plane ticket with an American Express Gold Card, you are entitled to 250 euros of expenses for clothing and basic necessities, per person, from 6 hours of baggage delivery delay. This is already much better than the 50 euros per day compensation offered by the airlines. However, you will have to pay for all your purchases with the card with which you bought your ticket for the insurance to work and send all the supporting documents to the insurance department of your card afterwards and within certain deadlines (see with the insurance)

What to do if your suitcase is definitely lost?

If after 20 days or so, the baggage service has still not found your suitcase, it will be considered permanently lost. You will therefore need to list precisely all the objects contained in your suitcase and indicate their value. The maximum amount reimbursed by airlines is €1295 (ceiling set by the Montreal Convention). If you have purchased baggage insurance, however, you will be able to obtain a higher reimbursement, usually double. But, in any case, it takes between one and two months to receive this sum after sending the complete file with supporting documents..

5 useful tips

Don't take overly valuable items on your trip and if you do, put them in your carry-on baggage instead. If you lose your suitcase in the hold, it will be less painful for you..

Remember to pack clothes in your carry-on bag. This way you will have a few extra outfits if your suitcase does not arrive.

If the baggage service is slow to retrieve your suitcase and/or the airline's customer service is not efficient by email or phone, tweet your dissatisfaction by sending your tweet directly to the airline (with an @ followed by the airline's name). You will have much more reactivity because they all want to avoid a bad buzz.

Equip your suitcase with a traceability system. There are suitcase covers with an integrated QR code that allows the owner of lost luggage to be quickly located. The person who finds the luggage just has to scan the code with a smartphone to get all the information about the owner. And if the suitcase is permanently lost, luggage insurance is included when you purchase the bag. More info at: http://www.bibelib.com

Buy a suitcase with integrated GPS. A few startups have entered this market recently. This allows you to locate your suitcase remotely, even if the baggage service cannot find it. However, these suitcases are quite expensive (from 400 to 500 euros, with luggage loss insurance included) and you will then have to convince the luggage service to send staff to pick it up where your GPS system has located it

If you have purchased a Blue Smart suitcase with GPS, you should know that an Uber will bring your suitcase to your home/hotel free of charge as soon as it is delivered to the airport