‘ Bidding on a stranger’s case is unsettling, not least because someone else might soon be rifling ’ through mine
languishing somewhere between Malta and Gatwick. It’s not just guilt I feel as I peer voyeuristically into the young woman’s case; it’s fury it’s her bag and not mine I’m holding.
We have all seen the recent pictures from Heathrow — vast seas of unclaimed suitcases and bags ‘like a scene from a disaster movie’, as one traveller arriving at Terminal 3 from the U.S. put it last week.
But the mayhem isn’t confined to the UK’s busiest airport — tales of snaking passenger queues and carpets of abandoned luggage have also come from Bristol, Gatwick and Manchester, where one pilot left the cockpit to load them onto his plane.
And this, we are warned, is just the start. With post- pandemic staff shortages biting at all UK airports, the mess we’ve seen so far is only set to worsen as the peak summer holiday period hits.
Never has that ritualistic checking of baggage into the hold felt more like spinning a roulette wheel and praying not to lose.
The problem existed pre-pandemic, too, of course — a whopping 25.4 million bags were mislaid in 2019 during air travel globally, roughly equivalent to 5.6 bags going missing for every 1,000 passengers.
Losing mine was the final indignity at the end of a nightmarish journey from Malta to our home in Kent in half term last month.
My husband Tom and I were woken at 4.30am on the day of our return to discover easyJet had cancelled the flight. I felt a flutter of panic. We had to get our two daughters back to school — but easyJet could offer only a flight six days later.
What ensued was a mad scramble to get home by any means: we ended up flying from Malta to Barcelona for an overnight stay, and then on to Dublin with Aer Lingus before the final leg to Gatwick. A complicated itinerary that meant taking bags on and off planes six times.
I last saw my red holdall at Barcelona check-in — I recall tucking in the straps, worried they might catch on the conveyor belt, and seeing it trundle off.
At Gatwick, hours later, we retrieved our main case from the carousel, though ominously it was one of the last out, and then waited...
One by one the other passengers disappeared. Still nothing. Nerves began to fray. The one chap on duty told us to wait a little longer — it might still turn up. But a horrible feeling of inevitability set in. Was it sitting in Spain? Dublin? All my lovely clothes!
We were joined by another traveller
whose case was also lost, distressed at the prospect of flying home longhaul the next day without her stuff.
And so began that heart- sinking traipse around the airport from one desk to another, asking for help from people who were perfectly pleasant but knew nothing remotely useful.
The man at the Aer Lingus desk cheerfully suggested waiting at the airport until 9pm — it was by now 5pm — but the girls were shattered. We called it a very long day and filled in an online lost luggage form.
A week later, despite daily calls to Aer Lingus’s lost luggage helpline, there was still no sign of the bag, but there was a record of it arriving at Gatwick. Into the black hole it had gone. I shuddered to think of my sweet red holdall in one of those mountains, squashed and split by the weight of hundreds of big cases.
And as I recovered from the stress of the journey, the anger built, too. How could they just lose it? It wasn’t like losing a pound coin down the back of a sofa — it was a bag full of clothes I loved.
Each day, we kicked ourselves as we discovered yet another thing we’d packed in there. My daughter’s school trainers, for instance, which I’d shoved in a compartment at the bottom. A little pouch of holiday jewellery. A dress I’d bought at the airport on the way out, and worn just a few times. My favourite sandals.
Nothing of huge financial value but things I wheel out year after year; clothes that signal it’s time to relax.
I pay £42 for a bag at Greasby’s, a graveyard for lost luggage
Outfits that conjure memories of previous holidays. Things I feel happy wearing.
I began to feel bloody-minded about it. If they couldn’t find it, then I would turn detective and do it myself. Which is how I came to find myself bidding for someone else’s missing case.
It’s worth saying that most people will get their lost suitcases back — though 23 per cent will be damaged or missing items — thanks to a barcode system. All major airlines use a process called the World Tracer System to track luggage, using information you provide — what it looks like, what’s in it and where it’s been.
But 6 per cent of the lost bags are never returned. This year the figure will be far higher.
What becomes of those bags? As I discovered, after three months they often end up at auction houses such as Greasby’s, a graveyard for lost luggage in Tooting, South London, which regularly receives unclaimed cases from Heathrow and other airports.
Before the pandemic, these were sold at live auctions with other goods, from furniture to bikes and electronics. Now it’s all carried out remotely using a system of Left Bids where the buyers fill out a detailed form, listing the lots they are interested in and declaring a maximum bid for each.
When I turned up on one of the viewing days before a June sale, the lots included 40 or so suitcases. I imagined the owners’ outrage at the undignified flogging off of their stuff and felt a pang of sympathy. Some bags still had bright scraps of fabric tied to the handles, attached by people who assumed they’d need to pick them out on the carousel. Two or three still had name tags.
The phone numbers were all American and, for a minute, I daydreamed about calling them. ‘Hey, guess what? I’ve found your case.’
I could then travel halfway across the world to reunite case with owner like some lost luggage vigilante. (I assume the airline tried to ring the numbers but the owners had given up on them, perhaps claiming on insurance instead.)
Although I knew it was way too early for my lost bag to end up here, my eyes still scanned the racks for red. That was how I settled on the Tommy Hilfiger case.
Auctioneer and Greasby’s owner Christine Sachett says a goodquality case is a good bet as you can often sell it on at a profit. Brands to look out for include Samsonite and Tumi, but it’s not always a guarantee the clothes inside will be good quality.
‘You’d be surprised,’ she said. ‘Sometimes we will open a rather battered case and find designer clothes in there.’
Christine and her team go through all the cases, taking out any jewellery, tech items such as phones and iPads, cosmetics and shoes, and auctioning these off separately to maximise profits.
The clothing is then returned to the case, though better- quality pieces or new garments are likely to be removed and others may be added so each case is full.
The premium items are kept in glass cabinets at the back of the sales room. When an item or a case is sold, Greasby’s take a commission and the rest is returned to the airline, which seems rather ironic given they lost the bags in the first place.
In the salesroom I notice a Smythson notebook embossed with ‘ Travels and Experiences’. More irony! Whoever owned that never saw it again.
There’s a new Burberry scarf and cabinets full of jewellery, mostly silver with semi-precious stones — the kind of thing you wear to dress up a summer outfit
and often has huge sentimental value even if it’s not worth much.
Then there are the lost pushchairs, the handbags and rucksacks, glasses cases and coats.
As for the bags, most contain holiday paraphernalia. The one I bought, and two others I also successfully bid on, are full of wellworn pieces that have probably taken the owners to many farflung places. A favourite jumper, a dress worn for an engagement party perhaps. Each item will be imbued with memories.
When we pack a suitcase, we curate a version of ourselves and it feels unsettling to look on somebody else’s choices.
‘Occasionally we’ll get a case with workman’s tools in it. And there was a wedding dress once,’ remembers Christine. ‘But generally, it’s holiday clothing which is clean if lost on the way out and not clean if lost on the way back.’
Either way, it’s sold exactly as it is, meaning you might end up bidding on a case of dirty laundry.
Prior to this summer’s airport blip, Christine had seen a decrease in the numbers of lost cases turning up here. ‘I have been at Greasby’s for 50 years — it was my dad’s business — and we get very little luggage now compared to back then. These days the airlines’ tracking system is very effective. We used to collect lorry loads of lost luggage. Now, they reunite almost everything that goes astray, which is incredible when you consider the amount of suitcases going through these airports.’
Greasby’s does get email enquiries from owners. But they don’t deal with these directly and instead refer them to the carriers.
As for my lost bag… amazingly it did turn up. Not at the auctioneers but unannounced on the doorstep, ten days after our nightmare flight.
I heard a knock at the door and there it was, in the arms of a courier. I was so delighted, I almost hugged him. Where had it been? I’m still none the wiser.
I gleefully opened the zip, glad that it was me looking through it, not a stranger on the scout for a bargain amid my dirty laundry.