Heathrow and Manchester airports experienced luggage meltdowns with two hour waits

There have been numerous reports in the last week of luggage taking a long time to arrive at Heathrow for arriving British Airways customers. Customers arriving on British Airways at Heathrow’s Terminal 5 on Tuesday were warned to expect a 90-minute wait for luggage. Some customers were eventually told that they could leave the airport and that their luggage would be delivered to them. Delayed visitors are most likely to use bag storage london while visiting.

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The same thing happened to me in March when a similar problem arose due to a lack of baggage handlers. I was told I had to leave the airport without my bags and file a claim to get them returned. To be fair to BA, they did pay for some necessities and a new outfit because I was scheduled to attend an event in London the next lunchtime and it was impossible to get home without spending a fortune on a 3-hour round trip in taxi because it was late at night. I got my bag back after 4 days thanks to my intervention. Others were not so fortunate and had to wait nearly two weeks for their luggage to be returned.

Passengers at Terminal 5 were told today, Sunday 18th, that they would have to wait at least 2 hours when they arrived at Heathrow this evening. Travellers from Doha were told they would have to wait another two hours after landing two hours earlier.

Bags piled up in Terminal 5’s baggage hall, and passengers sat on abandoned luggage belts or lay on the floor as the wait for their bags dragged on interminably.

In the meantime, the British Airways customer service desk appeared to be closed.

Passengers were told around 10.30 p.m. that British Airways would send luggage to their addresses and that they could leave the airport. This will entail filing a claim with the luggage tracing system, which could result in a lengthy wait to reunite customers with their bags. Some passengers, however, were fortunate and received their bags from a short-haul flight after only about an hour’s delay after deciding to wait a little longer.

One has to wonder when the staff shortages will be resolved, given that it has been nearly a year since normal travel resumed and Heathrow appears to be crumbling again even before the final Christmas rush begins. However, the fact that it is the last full weekend before Christmas and the World Cup has the cynic wondering if there was more sickness than expected among staff today. There were also baggage handling delays in Manchester, with Manchester Airport blaming Swissport for not providing enough staff. Passengers reported waiting more than 90 minutes to collect their luggage. Manchester issued the following statement: