Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | Friday Review | Young World | Property Plus | Quest | Folio |

CAVEAT EMPTOR

Lost your baggage?

Airline passengers must assert their right to compensation

"The scientific theory I like best is that the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage." Shruti Majumdar was reading this famous Mark Russel quotation late last year aboard an aircraft to Chennai. When she landed in Chennai, she realised (after waiting patiently for three hours) that her bags had joined the rings of Saturn. She contacted the airline staff, who assured her that the bags were not lost, only `misplaced' and that if she were kind enough to fill in a form, the airlines would rush the bags to her as soon as they found them.

The friendly airline staff also told her that misplaced baggage is an unavoidable hazard of air travel and that the airline would take all measures to find the bags for her. Shruti was quite concerned about this loss, since the bags contained among other personal effects, a new pair of shoes and her original college certificates.

Little did Shruti realise that the bags were on the way to Saturn! Several weeks after the episode (and after several phone calls and emails to the airline company), she got a letter from them confirming that they simply couldn't find the bags. They apologised for this loss, and offered to pay her as per the airline policy.

Like most consumers living in the "caveat emptor" era (where buyers have to beware!), she had no clue what the "airline policy" on lost baggage was. She learned (to her horror) that the airline policy on compensating you for them losing your baggage (entrusted to their care) in transit, was to pay you a standard rate calculated on the weight of your lost bag. Not the actual value of specific articles in the bag (for e.g., Shruti's new shoes) or the value of the bag or its contents, but on the weight of the baggage. How can you calculate the value of original college certificates by its weight?

The airline policy

But Shruti learned that the airline policy is as follows: If you lost a bag that weighed 10 kg, then you will get compensation equivalent to roughly between Rs. 200 and Rs. 450 per kg on domestic airlines in India. For international travel, this amount is roughly US $ 20 per kg. And to make Shruti feel better, the airline staff told her that recently an airline company had misplaced the prized Perazzi gun of India's Olympic hero Colonel Rathore, who was on his way back from an international competition.

So it doesn't matter whether you are a celebrity or not, your lost baggage will still be treated like old newspapers for the purpose of calculating compensation.

Shruti was miffed by this response. Surely, if she produced the receipt for purchase of the shoes, the airline company could at least pay for those. And what about the college certificates? The airline company couldn't help any further and so Shruti decided to ask a consumer group.

At the consumer group, she learned that this generous airline policy is due to the Carriage by Air Act, 1972, modelled on earlier international conventions that advocated the `compensate by weight' rule. Some airline companies print this information on the several flimsy pages that make up the air ticket.

Shruti also learned that despite this unilateral liability disclaimer by the airline company, Consumer Fora in India have asked airline companies to pay consumers compensation in addition to the "pay-by-weight" rule. Therefore, though the Fora have not struck down the consumer-unfriendly liability disclaimer, they have found other ways of making airline companies accountable for their negligence and inefficiency. Airline companies have paid up to a lakh of rupees as compensation in cases. But surely, this situation cannot depend on a case-by-case approach.

No one is expecting a sudden burst of generosity from airline companies. But a recent news report suggests that as many as three crore bags were mishandled on international flights in 2005 and over two lakh bags were lost. There is no doubt that airlines need to be more responsible towards their passengers' property and this can only be done if the rules are made more consumer friendly. Till this happens, consumers must assert their right to compensation.

(The writer works with CAG, which offers free Legal Advice on Consumer Complaints to its members. For membership details contact 24460387/ 24914358 or cag.helpdesk@gmail.com)

BHARATH JAIRAJ

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail