I roll up to the JFK curb for an 8:30 am flight. I give my info to the check-in guy. “Sorry sir, you can’t check you bag,” he says.
“Why not?” I ask.
“Check-in time is 45 minutes before departure.”
I look at my watch. It’s 7:46. “So, you’re going to bust me for being one minute late?”
“Sir, if you go inside and to the right, one of our agents will be happy to assist you with rebooking for a later flight.”
“Yeah right,” I think to myself, and scurry inside to a self-check-in kiosk, grumbling internally about how the car service was 20 minutes late and we hit traffic…
After punching all the buttons, I head to the kiosk baggage drop-off. They won’t let me check my bag either so I decide to try something I had read about others doing on The Consumerist but never had reason to use myself.
I pass through security theater and make it to the gate just as they were doing final boarding call. I ask the ticket agent if he has one of those tags so I can drop my baggage on the gangplank. He finds and affixes a cheery green tag my bag, hands me the receipt, I drop it off on the gangplank next to the baby strollers, and it meets me at baggage claim on the side just like normal.
So, if you’re ever running too late to check your baggage, remember that you can always do a last-minute drop-off on the gangplank.
(Photo: Maulleigh)
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its a little known fact that airports have become more dificult to get through for a few years now. apparently there was some kind of terrorist attack? either way, turns out everyone and their grandmother knows to get to the airport early. last time i flew, i was told to be there at least an hour ahead of time for check-in. seems reasonable to me. a flight isnt usually something you rush to; most likely you know about it weeks or months ahead of time. you picked the time of the flight and bought the tickets.
so unless it was some type of emergency, being ‘one minute late’ is unacceptable in this day and age. you know what youre getting into when you buy the ticket.
p.s. – when a slew of people on the Consumerist are defending the AIRLINE, you know you dont have a right to complain.
Maybe it’s just me, but I can’t recall the last time I showed up at an airpot 2 hours early and it didn’t include 1 hour and 40 minutes of sitting around in the terminal being bored out of my skull because I couldn’t find a power outlet and wouldn’t pay $9 for slow wifi.
As far as I’m concerned the OP was just fine in this situation. They just want you captive for a good while.
I wonder how anyone on standby can fly since they won’t have their baggage checked in time either?
@Edrebber: I only fly standby when I haven’t checked a bag. Then again, my home airport is PHL so I never check a bag.
You can fly standby if you check a bag, but your checked bag won’t be transferred to your earlier flight, negating the benefit of going standby in the first place.
I am with the people who say just get there on time. there is no reason unless a hospital emergency not to be at the airport ontime.
I am in the NYC area and getting through security takes awhile just by itself. So getting to the airport 45 min before the flight leaves is cutting it real close.
Is it too hard for you to to get there 2 hours early like the recommend? Just like EVERYONE ELSE? What makes you so special?
@edrebber:
They don’t check baggage.
@btdown:
You’re welcome to waste your time in airports. I choose not to. If you’ve never missed a flight, you’re spending too much time in airports. Personally, best airport experience I ever had was Rotorua in New Zealand. Arrive at counter at 10AM, checked in at 10:05, on the plane at 10:15, off the ground at 10:30. Had time to grab a coffee. No security lines at all (which might be a little much, but certainly was refreshing), and certainly none of this IDs/liquids/shoes/laptops garbage which, by making driving more appealing, is KILLING PEOPLE.
The 45 minute cutoff should be a 44 minute cutoff! Wait, it should be 43 minutes! 42! The answer, as always, is 42!
I optimistically assume the cutoff is 60 minutes and that there is 15 miutes of leeway.
The OP must not fly much. Because this is stupid. I flew 50 weeks a year for two years. And you have to always show up early….way early. And so help me had he gotten stopped for a random security search; this post wouldnt even be here.
Although people are surely correct that this is not an airline policy, but rather an airport or FAA policy, I agree. However, Airlines have reduced their gate and check in staffs to crazy small levels. This causes lines to be much longer and incidents like this that used to be handled by a supervisor, to be ignored.
In the last few years I have seen on more than 3 occasions a gate agent call the police to settle a dispute with a customer. These disputes all could have been handled by an airline spuervisor. The problem is that airlines understaff so much no that there are no supervisors. So airlines move the cost of conflict resolution onto local law enforcement.
My larger point is that the penny pinching ways of this industry have led to a terrible customer experience. You can lay blame on anyone else all that you want, but as usual this is all part of the money game and consumers are the one that loose out inthe form of crappy service and cattle car mentality.
The air travel experience is great is long as you look and act like a piece of cargo and not a human.
tom coughlin approves
@JustAGuy2: Sure we do. I regularly check bags when I have a later flight but am on standby for an earlier one. Usually the counter agents will check my bags on the earlier flight, so that even if I don’t get on it then they will, and will be waiting for me when I arrive.
I agree with a good majority of the posts above me. If you are on time, you would not have this problem. Yes it was only by one minute, but like I am sure most people have heard before… “five minutes early is on time. On time is late.” This proves it perfectly. If you are just “on time” then you run the risk of being one minute late. At that point, yes the computers probably hit the cut off time.
@xtc46: Yep I’m most inclined to believe this explanation. I was once trying to buy alcohol at a store that stopped selling at 12:00. She scanned it at 12:01 and I couldn’t buy because the computer refused to process it.
Something similar happened to me. I was standing in line for the self-check in kiosks with United, and I was supposed to be next, but the attendant directed the people behind me in line (they didn’t speak English) to the next kiosk. I was pissed. When I got up to the kiosk, it didn’t work, and I asked the attendant to help me, and she said I was a minute late and missed my flight. Then instead of rebooking me, she directed to a telephone where I was put on hold, and when someone finally picked up, told me they couldn’t help me and I needed to talk to the attendant. The attendant, by the way, could barely speak English as well, and when she tried typing in my confirmation codes, she was typing in my American Airlines code for my return flight. Stupid stupid woman. I was finally able to find someone with a little common sense, and he was able to rebook me for a better flight than I was originally booked for in the first place.
I get so annoyed with the people who show up late (for no good reason) and ask to cut ahead in the security line, special treatment, hold up the plane, etc. I know sometimes stuff happens but I think most of these people just show up late and they figure out that if they show up late they can cut the line, etc. I with the rules were better enforced and if you were late (unless you had a note from your doctor) you didn’t get any special treatment and you got stuck. Pretty soon people would learn to show up on time.
I had something kinda similar happen to me, I was flying out of a smaller airport and the flight was leaving at 6:35am. Well when I get to the airport at 4:45 it is closed. As in no one is there but security. I talked to one of the security guys and was told they didn’t open the airport till 6am. I was freakin out because I would only have 35 min to get my ticket, check bags and go thru security. Luckily a airline employee came in right on time and I was the first person in line so I made it. What was weird was the flight was supposed to be full but I saw only about a 1/3rd of the seats were taken. I guess there were a lot of no shows or late arrivals.
@BigNutty: Agreed. I cant stand people who are constantly late, and then bitch about how they cant get stuff done.
You know, if you leave the house a little earlier, maybe you wont run into this problem again.
I’ve learned to add a +10 minutes adjustment whenever my friend says he’ll show up.
I can’t believe I’m the first to say it, but:
WHY NOT CHECK IN ONLINE???
@xtc46: Exactly. Not only is the computer cutoff time a possibility, but a check-in agent is only a small part of an overall process designed to keep things running smoothly. It’s entirely possible an agent might be reprimanded for allowing too many bags to be processed too much time after the “official” cutoff. Besides, are they supposed to makes exceptions for one minute? 5? 10? When does it end?
Also, what if the poster’s watch was off by a few minutes?
@Treved: It makes no difference to Delta.
[www.delta.com]
Should a person really automatically miss a flight because they are running late (in this case for a reason we don’t know)? Is this a process that keeps things running smoothly? I don’t think that most people consider airport experiences to be characterized as smooth for a variety of reasons, but recent airline policy has certainly not helped to smooth it over.
When people stick so fervently to policies that can be easily circumvented, esp. with assistance from a supervisor or another agent, then the initial unhelpful and unbending employee who sticks to that policy with such dedication is doing a major disservice to others. People do not have to be automated just because technology is going in that direction. It is what differentiates us from the machines seem to be controlling us. As far as I am concerned, the agent, in this instance, could just be replaced by an electronic kiosk, as he offers no additional benefit to the consumer.
I recently had a FedEx delivery that was scheduled to be delivered to me. FedEx claimed that the package was mislabeled and could not be delivered to me, so I would have to pick it up. When I spoke with the first rep. she said that she would have it relabeled and sent to me the next day. Unfortunately, the package was not relabeled, and I called in today.
When I spoke with a new rep. today, he indicated that I could only pick it up, and by FedEx policy, the company could not send the package to a different address from that which the item was labeled to be delivered. He did not give me another alternative. I indicated that the policy had already been misrepresented by at least one agent, and they should just deliver the package to me. He would not budge. I finally requested to speak with his supervisor, who said that the package was already being processed to be delivered despite my call! Apparently there was such a volume of requests that FedEx just could not process mine until I called. The second agent was so entrenched in policy that he could not even check that.
The second agent who I spoke with adamantly stuck to his policy claim without suggesting any alternatives. I wasted my time before a holiday on the phone (when I just as easily could have been wasting it here!). That employee has now received a complaint. I’m sure it won’t do much for him, but it’s been quite a waste of time for me. Incidentally, I called the company, from which I ordered the package, and they claimed that the label was processed correctly. Newegg will now call FedEx to complain as well.
So the person who arrived at the airport late should have been on time (and given the benefit of doubt, we can assume that he attempted to be there on time), but he was one minute late for check in. He would not hold up the plane due to his tardiness (another assumption, but I think a fair one). Should a person really be punished to the degree that he cannot fly to his destination as a result of one minute?
Some of you are really unforgiving, esp. given the one minute variable. People are becoming so formulaic that it is difficult to even interact with them. I feel like it takes the humanity out of life to operate so stringently, but it’s pretty clear that a number of posters here feel that travel, at least, should be that way. I hope that you don’t take that further in life.
Honey, You were one minute late for dinner. You will have to wait until tomorrow before you have the opportunity to eat again…
Wow, that was a really long post. Happy Thanksgiving; make sure to get to your destinations on time; otherwise, the holiday could be taken away from you.
A “gangplank”? Heh. Avast, ye scurvy passengers. The bloomin’ bag may not inflate even though oxygen is flowing to it, mateys. Arrrr!
It’s a “jetway”.
You know it’s vastly amusing to read all the comments complaining that the poster didn’t give a reason for being late to the airport, when previous browsing indicates he would have gotten nailed for posting the reason.
This merely seemed like a pretty useful tip for dealing with a bag you didn’t want to carry-on when missing the deadline. It would still be useful to know if you had gotten to the gate and decided you didn’t want to lug your carry-on through the aisle at 44 mins before your flight or as you were boarding.
@mgyqmb:
I fly with you all the time, and I mind. Now I know who the smug little twerp with the misplaced sense of entitlement and his girlfriend are. Did you really think no one noticed that you and your girlfriend taking up most of an overhead bin with your backpacks and that it doesn’t bother other passengers? I’d love to take my rolling suitcase on board with me, but I don’t, because them’s the rules.
@mgyqmb:
“…usually no one minds.” Correction: usually no one says anything to you. We mind.
Do you think none of your fellow passengers ever had the brilliant insight to bring 50l of their personal belongings into the cabin of the plane? Did you just figure you were smarter than everyone else? We mind a lot.
@xtc46:
I remember on one episode of A&E’s “Airline,” two business partners were trying to check-in very close to the 20-minute cut off time at SWA. One person was ticketed at 20 minutes and 1 second and the other person was ticketed at 19 minutes and 59 seconds. The flight was oversold and one business partner got bumped b/c she didn’t make the cut-off time. The gate agents were at a loss for an explanation until they examined the ticket closer, and realized what happened. The duo decided to wait for the next flight, but was visibly upset.
Moral of the story…every second counts!
Yeah, it sucks to have to take a later flight if you’re late. I don’t want to wait around airport terminals for ages, either, but in NY I always leave way, way early because the lines are long for everything. I bring a book, get coffee and breakfast, and relax. Time goes fast.
Once we were standing in a long, long security line and some cute young women — who were way behind us and, I assume, had arrived late — were moved to the front of the line. They were on the same flight as ours! People in line on that flight started griping loudly, but, as you know, you can’t cause a fuss or you’ll be arrested. We all got on, but I was pretty angry… if you’re going to help people in the back of the line make thier flights, make sure there aren’t still people in the front and middle of the lines first.
I don’t really have sympathy for the late arrivals; 45 minutes is cutting it close. For my own self-preservation I would NEVER arrive that close to a flight. And it is the fault of too few employees on duty, combined with idiotic Homeland Security rules.
It may be they would love to bend the rules but are afraid of getting their heads bitten off by the other customers who are just as aggrevated by delays and AREN’T getting any help.