It was my first two-way airline baggage mishap.
On a recent trip, Northwest Airlines misplaced my luggage on the flight out and on the return flight as well.
At departure, the checked bags were improperly tagged by the skycap. It took a day to find them in San Francisco, rather than in my destination city of Seattle. On the way back, the bags didn't make the connection between Northwest flights in Detroit, although I did. A day later, the bags were delivered to my home.
My inconvenience, of course, is small potatoes compared to the experience of Felice Lippert, whose bag containing more than $400,000 worth of jewelry was lost at a Palm Beach International Airport security checkpoint in 1986.
She has to settle for a payment of $1,250, the limit on an airline's liability for lost luggage, because the Florida Supreme Court recently declined to hear her lawsuit against Delta Air Lines challenging that $1,250 limit.
According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, its most recent monthly air travel consumer report showed a modest increase in mishandled-baggage complaints. There were 5.17 reports per 1,000 passengers, compared to 4.81 a year ago.
Least likely to misplace baggage was Southwest, at 3.45 reports per 1,000; followed by America West, at 3.73; and Alaska Airlines, at 4.37. Next came TWA (4.45), Northwest (5), American (5.14), USAir (5.25), Continental (5.69), United (5.74) and Delta (5.8).
"A ton of items are excluded from the $1,250 maximum," said Randy Peterson, editor of Inside Flyer magazine. "When my new computer didn't arrive with me after I checked it in, I was told it wasn't covered, and I wasn't given one cent."
No liability is assumed for electronic equipment, antiques, nTC documents, jewelry, photographic equipment, photographs, paintings, manuscripts, keys or animals, said James Faulkner, a spokesman for Northwest.
If bags are delayed, lost or damaged on a domestic flight, the airline will likely invoke the $1,250 ceiling on the amount of money it will pay you. When your luggage and contents are worth more than that, you may want to buy "excess valuation" from the airline as you check in. The airline may refuse to sell excess valuation on some items.
"What you're doing with excess valuation is increasing the airline's ceiling on what it will pay if you can prove your loss," said Con Hitchcock, counsel for Public Citizen, a nonprofit group in Washington. "The airlines pay the current value of items you've lost, not replacement value, so they've got schedules that say how much a 2-year-old suit is worth."
