In general, a lost bag isn’t that big of a deal if you are flying with an airline that does things professionally given that most bags are found and delivered in around 24 hours. I learned that Iberia is far from professional when a bag goes missing.
Reporting the lost bag
In Madrid, everything was in chaos. Spanish people continue to surprise me by their ability to make fuss about everything and their lack of understanding of signs. At the customer service counter, people were joining the line from exit rather than entrance and economy class passengers were continuously told to go away from the business class line… Only for them to try to sneak back in 5 minutes later… Madre mía…
When it was my turn, everything went smoothly and the agent handled the situation professionally. I was surprised how easy it was and how quickly I got to continue my journey with a duly filled report – my bag was still at Heathrow. I thought handling my case would have taken longer given that every Spaniard before me took their time in vocally lamenting their poor situation.
Fake delivery notification and calling Iberia
I was told on Friday that Iberia has so many daily flights between London Heathrow and Madrid Barajas that I will surely get my bag on Saturday. And sure enough, I got an email telling me that my bag has been shipped on a flight that would arrive at 14:00 on Saturday. Phew… But this was a lie – my bag never left Heathrow.
On Sunday, I called Iberia customer service (yuck, yuck, yuck). I hate calling so much given that you never know how much calling a foreign number is gonna cost you. Iberia also had a chat in their app and a WhatsApp number… Both of them are operated by bots and both crashed as soon as I gave the tracking code.
The agent in the call service told me that my bag is scheduled to be shipped on Monday. Like wtf? Their tracking tool didn’t indicate this at all, so the only way of knowing what the actual status of your bag is is to call them… 🙄 Anyway, I was to continue my journey to a next destination on Tuesday, so I told them to deliver the bag to the airport for pickup rather than my hotel. I inquired where I could pick my bag up in the airport and I was told to ask anyone at the airport… That’s Spanish for F you, like I cared.
Bag found and lost and found again
On Monday, I was very nervous… Will I get my bag before my next flight and what should I do if I won’t? All my clothes were in that bag.. Ever since Saturday the tracking site has just said bag shipped, nothing more, so I couldn’t really know what would happen on Monday. I checked the status regularly and I noticed that that the status had changed back to searching… Did they lose my bag again? A bit later, the status changed to found again… And back to shipped.
Only at 4 in the morning on Tuesday, I got a cryptic message about an airport pickup and handing my luggage over to a delivery company? Huh? Delivery company for an airport pickup? Wtf, Iberia! So, not knowing whether I would see my bag again, I headed to the airport.
Where to pickup delayed luggage in Madrid Barajas?
It was time to find my bag, so let’s just ask anyone… 🙄 I went to Iberia customer service desk and they told me to go to arrivals and some bullshit about crossing a street to find a building where it says baggage… Yeah, yeah, F you too. I went to the arrivals floor and asked someone in the lost and found counter. She told me I had to go to the arrivals hall to the baggage reclaim area! Yes, through those one way doors that lead to baggage belts.
So I walked to the restricted area and a guard approached me, but he let me in as soon as I told him I had a delayed bag. I went to the Iberia customer service counter where nobody greeted me and when I showed them my luggage tracking number, they just called someone without saying a word to me. While the line was ringing, they were just ignoring me and chatting with each other about random crap. After some waiting, I was told to go to the special luggage area. Other people had waited for longer than me, but since my bag is yellow, it was the easiest to find. Like they really cared about their job…
Special luggage belt
Go between belts 5 and 6, I was told, so I went there to find an American airlines counter. I asked them and they told me to go on the opposite side of the hall, again between belts 5 and 6… Well, I went to the opposite side and found a special luggage belt between belts 5 and 4, but sure. I was so happy when I saw a yellow bag on the belt. My bag was recovered only half an hour before the check-in counters for my next flight opened.
Silver lining
In EU, airlines have to pay expenses for hygiene products and medicine you need to buy when your luggage is delayed. So at least I got some money back from Iberia. My travel insurance also covers buying clothes for 100e for each day of delay, so I got some new clothes too. So in the end, I just got new stuff for free for having my bag delayed. Had the bag been delayed on my way home, nobody would have covered any of my expenses.
Conclusion
Losing your bag isn’t the end of the world if you have an insurance, especially if you recover the bag later. If I learned anything, it’s that it makes sense to have an easily recognizable bag like my yellow one with a Pikachu on it. But honestly, Iberia is like whatever when they mess up. They have 8 daily flights between LHR and MAD. Taking 3 days to send my bag to Madrid and an additional day to make it ready for pickup is unacceptable… 🙄 Last time I had a delayed bag stuck in Heathrow, British Airways delivered it to my hotel the next day.
