Cabin Baggage allowance.

[Rhossydd]

that leaves just BA, who have had issues this year with Cabin staff and strike action.

That was completely resolved a few weeks ago now, so BA remain a safe bet.

I've never had problems with them and are definitely my preferred choice.

[kikashi]

That was completely resolved a few weeks ago now, so BA remain a safe bet.

I've never had problems with them and are definitely my preferred choice.

Mine too.

Jeremy

[Nick Rains]

Just FYI, Qantas have a new checked baggage policy starting June 1. You were charged $10 per kilo if you were overweight on the 23kg limit. From June 1 it will be per extra piece up to 23kg and domestically it will cost $30 (I think). So you can take 46kg checked for a small extra charge.

I just flew to the five main cities around Australia on Qantas and not once did I have my hand luggage weighed. You can take two pieces up to 7kg each. I use an FStop backpack which weighs 15kg but the internal ICU can be taken out so you can have two bits at about 7kg each. Works for me...

[Richard Morwood]

I flew Belfast-Heathrow-Singapore-Christchurch & Auckland-Singapore-Heathrow-Belfast with Singapore Airlines in December 2010 and only encountered one problem in all of those flights. Auckland decided after checking in but just before you were going to proceed through security that everyones hand luggage had to be weighed for "safety reasons" and I had 55kgs of photo gear in 3 bags (there were 5 of us I wasn't carrying all 55kgs!). I was sent back down to the check-in desks presumably to have some luggage sent as hold luggage. The staff doing the weighing were very unclear as to what the check-in staff were going to do but I assumed that this was their intention.
Fortunately the girl at the check-in was brilliant. She disappeared and came back with 2 Singapore Airlines bags and into each I put 3 lenses and a body and give my 2 youngest daughters one each to carry. The check-in girl gave me the official line about safety and overhead lockers, etc, etc, and I resisted the temptation to explain that I would much rather have a 12kg padded bag fall on me rather that a D3X or 70-200 f2.8 in a non-padded Singapore Airlines bag.
Once we "equalised" all bags to be about 10-12ks each she then said that once passed security I should just put everything back into the backpacks as they were and that really she was just keeping the more officious staff at security happy.
So nice to encounter Airport ground staff who are pleasant, helpful and capable of applying common sense. Not one of the other 5 flights gave us a second glance with our obviously overweight bags.
Having said that when we arrived in Christchurch our hold luggage took an extra 48 hours to join us and on returning to Belfast again our hold luggage took another 24 hours to catch up.
Regards
Richard

[llcopperworth]

Baggage allowance can be a fine balancing act. It really comes down to luck of the draw in many cases - ie. will the cabin crew except your winning smile or will they stick to the absolute letter of the rules. But sometimes an entire airport can be consumed by this kind of officiousness. I was staying in Mombasa last year and it seemed like all the check in staff would not budge from the stated weight allowance

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

I had wight of hand luggage checked at KLM, Virgin, Ryan Air and Wizzair recently. Here is what I do:

1) Use a Gura Gear Kiboko bag to keep weight down
2) I use a Domke Photo Togs west, the Macbook 13.3" I carry fits nice in one of the inner pockets
3) All stuff that is not critical goes into checked bag, including tripod


Best regards
Erik