For those following along at home with the
baggage allowance/interline question from before:
The short answer (from the ground agent)!is "I don't know, it's probably 40kg, but there's no definitive answer. I guess it works?".
More detail below. Keep reading for absolute mayhem in living form (exaggeration but I believe things did get astray at times).
Long answer? Buckle up it's a crazy ride ahead. I just caught up with my friend who asked this question, they've finally landed in Melbourne, all bags intact. What I'm about to write is a rough transcription of the events that occurred.
So, friend goes to the J check-in counter for SQ at BLR, hands over a passport and two e-tickets/itineraries.
One is a (VA stock, e-ticket number beginning with 795) ticket that has two segments: SIN-BLR and BLR-SIN, both in SQ J. SIN-BLR was 'consumed' in Dec 2022 so only BLR-SIN is relevant at this point.
The other is a (SQ stock, e-ticket number beginning with 618) ticket that has two segments: MEL-SIN and SIN-MEL. MEL-SIN was 'consumed' in Dec 2022 (which interlined onto SIN-BLR) so only SIN-MEL is relevant at this point.
Agent at the desk goes to town on the keyboard, saying "Madam you're going to Singapore today, do you have a visa?", to which my friend replies "I'm not going to Singapore, I'm going to Melbourne". Agent says "But madam system shows Singapore as destination". "Also if you're going to Melbourne show proof of entry allowance to the Australian country ".
Eventually after explaining the mechanics of the ticket purchase and after a few exasperated sighs from the agent, she eventually got two boarding passes printed, showing a journey all the way to MEL.
All good so far right?
Wrong. Damn wrong.
"Madam do you have any bags to check-in?" "Yes, I've got 2 here". They are placed on the belt. Turns out the big bag is 27kg and the small one is 8kg. Not sure if my maths is correct but that's a total of 35kg.
Agent chimes in "You can collect these in Singapore as you're going there as your destination". Apparently completely forgot about the entire issue from before.
"Umm, my journey is to Melbourne. Also, I know that Business class has 40kg and Economy is 30kg. Given that the first flight is Business and the second is Economy, am I allowed a 40 or 30 kilo allowance? Lastly, can these be checked all the way to Melbourne?". The response? "Yes madam I can check these all the way to Melbourne that's no problem". "But what about the allowance?" "Madam it's 40 kilos till Singapore then 30 for Melbourne". "But you just said it's going all the way to Melbourne". "Yes madam". "So is it 40 or 30 that's allowed by the rules?". "Yes madam". It eventually just got tagged and sent away for loading into the aircraft's belly.
At this point I figure my friend just gave up and got the boarding passes and got the hell out of there. I couldn't believe the level of incompetence after hearing this exchange take place. That too in the J line. Forget about any of this if checking-in in the regular Y lines. In the end I'm just as confused as when I was initially asked this question, and damn embarassed that they don't have an answer still. I really expected more.
Not only that, the seat assignments were stuffed up and bulkhead seat reservations were lost.
On another note,
how do I get to learn more about these? I feel I know a lot hence the regular barrage of requests for help from family/friends, but I believe my knowledge is only the tip of the tip of the iceberg in terms of all there is to know about these regulations dealing with a GDS, check-in systems, etc etc.
Thanks for attending my TED Talk.
