Carry on needs to be carried out

For me, it depends on whether or not I have a layover. Once a very long time ago I had an international trip and a layover connection I barely made but alas my luggage did not. I was without my clothes for a week and was on a limited budget so I had to recycle the same clothes for the whole week. Since then I’ve been more wary of checking my luggage when connecting flights.

I feel the same way. I used to never check bags for a long time. Once I got status and I started checking bags it's kinda nice to not have to drag bags around and stress about overhead space.

Yeah they’re too fast - haven’t gotten my miles for late bag since the holidays. And yeah so nice not to wheel that mofo all over the airport.

Depends on the airport. The bulk of my AS flying has been SEA - ONT or SNA. Checking bags maybe works on the leg going back to SEA, but going to the other two airports, especially ONT, I'm on the freeway before bags are out.
I'm probably an outlier, and even though I don't travel that route much anymore, it's become habit to just carry it on wherever. One less variable to worry about.

I always do the free bag check when it’s offered. I never have a layover, and I have a bad shoulder that gets cranky with overhead motion, so it’s a win win 😂 it’s so convenient, too. This way I also don’t have to stress about finding space and holding up the line while I put my bag up/take it down, and it usually comes out really quick when I go wait for it

I used to be a carry-on only kind of guy until recently and I swear by checking bags only now lol

I fly relatively frequently. I stopped checking bags the second time they got lost (left behind during a gate check and had to drive a 6 hour round trip to the nearest airport because they wouldn't ship the bag).

Never again.

In my experience only SEA and SFO actually don’t end up in miles. Even that is a miss a lot of the time. “Alaska listens” doesn’t reply about half the time if it is close. They pretty much ignore anything under 30 minutes.

I pack carryon size only, I don’t like having to get to the airport earlier to check bags, I don’t like having to wait around the airport like a doofus for a bag, there’s zero percentage chance of an airline losing my luggage if I am in control of it the entire time?

If I’m flying to Seattle the last thing I want is to check my bag. That airport is so dysfunctional

I’ve had very bad luck with Alaska getting my bags to the destination in one piece when checking bags over the last 5 years or so, and that has led me to trying to avoid checking bags if at all possible even with the credit card. 1 bag completely destroyed (looked like it had been dragged on the pavement), 2 suitcases damaged, and 2 instances of one or more piece of checked luggage not making it to the destination with me in that time period and I never flew enough to hit MVP until this year.

It’s only free if you use the card to pay for the ticket. They changed that policy few years ago. I usually gate check unless I know the baggage area will be a shitshow (SEA).

Alaska's lost a bag for just about everyone I know. The bags all turned up eventually but I'd rather not deal with that.

The main reason I do carry-ons only is because I realized that I don't need to haul a bunch of stuff I don't need wherever I go. I do 4-5 weeks in Europe with carry-ons. There are laundromats everywhere.

We once gate-checked the child’s car seat and stroller at the gate in ONT heading back to SEA. For whatever reason, someone took it from the jetway and put it on a plane to … Tucson. I’ll never know what they were thinking (Tucson was two gates down) and getting home and realizing that was super fun.

So I’d rather just carry all my shit on. If I’m in charge of it I know it’s not being lost.

Apart from the price I don't want to stand in line to check my bag, especially because my home airport is really busy (LAX).

Because when I land, I just want to get in a car and get where I’m going. I don’t want to stand around and wait for my bag.

This actually makes a bunch of sense.

I've thought about this before, but gate agents would have to inspect everyones personal item to make sure it wasn't a carry on size. Or inspect the person to see how many items they're carrying.

But I agree, (dating myself here) when checked baggage used to be free, I rarely had a carryon--just a book and/or newspaper. Boarding seemed smoother.

I assume airlines profit from checked baggage is more than they'd save shaving off minutes from boarding.

Just charge by the pound for the lot

Brilliant

They don’t want to have to hire more people to load bags, carry ons require less labor on the airline part and open more space for freight.

This. I stopped checking when they started charging. Flying with a family it adds up quickly. I also always have a 2.5 hour drive home from either Sea or GEG. In that 20 minutes I’m already at my car and headed home

Unless they have a tight connection

I’ve only had them lose my bag once (in the past 2 years), but it was a super unpleasant experience. Coming off like 8 hours of travel delays already, it’s almost midnight and I had to wait about 45 minutes in line to talk to an agent. I was on a work trip, so they said they’d deliver to my hotel. When they finally delivered it they never bothered to tell me in any way (despite the agent telling me they would notify me when it was en route). I found out it had been delivered because I called the luggage desk for an update (which took forever because they just wouldn’t pick up the phone, even during normal business hours), and then had to go track it down in the hotel because for some reason they delivered it to a weird area. On the plus side they gave me $100 to get some replacement clothes and toiletries, but yeah it was a royal pain.

Also in SeaTac that 20 minute guarantee is worth fuck all. Last flight I took it took 45 minutes (and with all the construction baggage claim is a nightmare). I’ve had more instances than I can count where the screens say one carousel and then your bags just show up on a different one and nobody bothers to tell you. I try to skip that if I can

As a 75k for 8 years running, my experience doesn't match yours. I have ran about a 20% missing bag rate on about 25 total checked bags. Then dealing with Alaska's apathetic response to missing bags and the sometimes 1.5hrs to actually get a hold of a baggage agent at the end of the flight. It only takes a couple of these experiences to sour you on ever checking your bag. Nothing is better than wasting 1.5 hours in the airport, then having your bag arrive 2 days later, then having baggage claim sit on it for 2 days before over nighting it to you. All the while no communication, and when you get a hold of someone they can't answer the most basic questions about status. Then you're sitting there wondering if the bag is going to arrive at your hotel after you leave to head back home, and now you have a whole new problem.

...and 20 minutes my ass. Here's the catch, you have to claim your points with a baggage agent while at the airport. Good luck finding a baggage agent at smaller airports or on late arriving flights.

F' that. F' Alaska's 1970s baggage handling system. The ONLY time I check is when I have something that can't be carried on or we're on extended vacation, then only items that can be missed for the first 3 days.

And seriously, if Alaska started charging for carry on bags their elites would exodus to another airline. Doing 30 trips a year I can't add 45-60 minutes to each flight. That's a horrible idea.

Then it needs to be included in the ticket price and also actually make it to the ticket holder's destination. People aren't playing Hunger Games for bin space for no reason. Remember who the real enemy is.

Maybe an unpopular opinion, but try paying attention to how long their legs are. With economy seat pitch being minimal (admittedly Alaska being better than most), the capability to stretch out your legs, especially on longer flights should not be underestimated. As long as they are only bringing on one carry-on, I think they deserve equal access to overhead bin space. Especially considering that their carry-on bag takes up less bin space than larger rollaboards. It sounds like privilege to expect those with smaller bags to sacrifice leg space in order for you to have space for your larger bag. Now if they bring on two bags and stow both bags in the overhead bin, then yeah, that's a bit inconsiderate. Otherwise, if you're so concerned with having room for your rollaboard into an overhead bin, you should probably be checking it.

I think it's unfair to expect someone that checked a bag (thus saving space for everyone) to sacrifice leg room for those that did not (eating up more of the common space).

If I have a carryon suitcase and a backpack, I can either put the suitcase in the overhead bin and the backpack at my feet, or I can check the suitcase and put the backpack in the bin. The second takes up less bin space but I have to defend my choice to have my feet space for my feet. Maybe I'll start bringing a little (empty) drawstring bag to put at my feet so all you people leave me alone about my backpack going in the overhead.

If I bring one bag on and it’s a mid size backpack, guess what? It’s going in the overhead bin. I want my leg space and it takes up way less space than your damn roller carryon

My past several flights, FAs have announced that only wheeled bags should go in the overheads. That doesn’t stop a bunch of chumps from parking their backpacks and jackets up there, though.

That's not part of the discussion. Medical equipment is not a carry-on; it's a necessity. We're talking about people abusing carry-on policies and/or not understanding the etiquette.

Your post or comment was removed as it is in violation of Rule 1 (Treat everyone with courtesy and respect). Repeated violations of this rule will result in a permanent ban.