Swift Baggage Return is New Aim

By Michael Silence, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn.

Apr. 26–Knoxville’s airport has to deal with more than 5,000 pieces of lost luggage per month, a vast majority belonging to passengers flying into McGhee Tyson Airport.

Airport officials are moving toward a centralized lost luggage system to deliver those bags to their owners more efficiently and to cut costs.

The findings are contained in an extensive study the airport commissioned to look into the Metropolitan Knoxville Airport Authority taking over traditional airline duties, such as the return of that luggage.

And that’s an emerging trend in the industry, said Dick Marchi, senior adviser to the Washington, D.C.- based Airports Council International-North America. ACI is an advocacy group for airports, and many of its members are executives at those airports.

“They recognize it’s an opportunity to do it at a lower cost,” Marchi said.

The Knoxville study states, “As most airlines have reduced public contact staffing hours in the airport, this has led to many travelers being dissatisfied with the service when they have had a baggage issue, especially after the airline baggage service offices and ticket counters close in the evening.”

It also states, “When a baggage problem or issue happens, not being able to discuss it with an airline representative in person, and being asked to call an 800-number to discuss it with someone offshore, who may not know where (the airport) is located geographically, is more than some passengers are willing to tolerate.”

Knoxville’s airport handles more than 200,000 pieces of luggage monthly, said Dave Conklin, vice president of marketing.

The study notes that the airport could centralize duties like handling luggage and how it handles the return of lost luggage.

For example, the airport doesn’t have a room where passengers can report or claim their lost luggage, Conklin said.

As it is now, the airlines handle the return of lost luggage and a person has to go to the ticket counter to report a lost bag or suitcase.

Under a plan approved by the airport board, the airport would handle the luggage as opposed to the various airlines.

Also, returning lost luggage currently is not a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week practice.

The airport would make it a 24/7 operation, and it would be more efficient, Conklin said.

For example, rather than various airlines making individual trips to Sevier County to return luggage, the airport could do that all in one trip.

Marchi said small airports have taken over and consolidated services for years, and it’s starting to catch on with larger airports.

“There is more discussion among airport directors whether they should be getting into a lot of this. A lot of the impetus is coming from airports that have problems with screening” of luggage, he said.

Airlines do screening differently, so an airport could have four or five different screening systems.

But if an airport handles screening, there’s just one system, and that’s more efficient, Marchi said.

—–

To see more of The Knoxville News-Sentinel or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.knoxnews.com.

Copyright (c) 2007, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.