To not understand easyJet's obsession with putting hand luggage in the hold.

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Something that's been puzzling me for a while is what is easyJet's (and possibly other airlines?) obsession with trying to put cabin bags in the hold?

Last few flights I've been on, they've cited not enough space in the cabin, fair enough, even though we were probably half way down the queue, so not even the last to board.

Last weekend when we flew, we booked seats up front / speedy boarding and were one of the first 20 to board, and they were saying to leave bags by the steps to go into the hold. Yet there was plenty of space on the overhead lockers.

Then yesterday, we are at airport and the app was giving me notifications encouraging me to do a bag drop and "go hands free"!

I don't get it!

After all these years of being encouraged to travel light, I've gone from being that person with the heavy label stuck on my huge case that's going in the hold, to being able to holiday for a week with just a cabin bag and I've enjoyed the freedom of not having to wait at baggage reclaim.

Yet, they now seem intent to to back to the 'old ways'.

Anyone here work for easyJet that can enlighten me? Other opinions obviously most welcome. 😁

The only hand luggage I take on is my handbag ( with any essentials like medication) everything else in my suitcase .

They would need to break the fingers of my cold corpse hands to get that from me !

It makes turn around time quicker if passengers aren't putting things in the overhead lockers. Things going into and out of the hold don't impact on the cabin plus it's not the crew doing it.

Why does it matter? They do it for free so long as your bag is within the allowed dimensions.

Whether there is room or not is not necessarily to do with whether there is literal room in the overhead lockers - it will also be to do with safety and weight distribution. Same as when on an empty flight they move people around so it's evenly weighted on each side.

I am happy to put my hand luggage in the hold. I am also happy to get on and off the plane last! I pack essentials and electronics in to a separate bag within my hand luggage and then I can just grab that out easily and give them the main bag to put in the hold.

They’ve discovered not enough people are willing to pay to put luggage in the hold and overall too many have more than just tiny hand luggage

More people than ever have 'small' cases so that there is simply not enough room to put them all above the seats. Probably caused by a mixture of more people taking short breaks, having items they do not want to be too far from, fear of luggage going missing and also the policy of charging extra (which to be fair, is not one started by Easyjet but by the devil's airline, Ryanair.)

Because people who think they can take all their essentials for a week’s holiday as hand luggage cause delays boarding and getting off.

When I was travelling with small children I liked putting the cabin bags in the hold. Made no difference as I also had to pick up the hold luggage and pushchair. I also found that by the time you got through passport control your bags were ready anyway. Also made it easy to carry smallest child (scared of stairs) up and down the steps to the plane.

They know how many cases they can have and count.

Good, I'm sick to death of people ramming their bulging rucksacks in an already full overhead locker. A woman actually tried to move my handbag halfway down the plane to squeeze her luggage in on a recent flight

I think the whole luggage thing has gone full circle. Originally the budget airlines were encouraging passengers to have less luggage as less weight on the aircraft cuts the fuel bill, but they get charged for late take offs and the quicker they can get people on and off, the better.

Remember when the bag drop was literally dropping off the bag with no queue if you'd checked in online? With budget airlines flying to holiday destinations (not just serving city breaks) and fewer holiday companies operating their own airlines the customer profile has changed and the behaviours are different.

Thank for the replies. Having bags in the hold speeding things up for the airline makes sense I guess. Feels like airlines made a rod for their own backs though. They want to charge for hold baggage, passengers don't want to pay, so more and more just take carry on luggage, which can't all fit in the cabin.

Good, I'm sick to death of people ramming their bulging rucksacks in an already full overhead locker. But that's what the overhead lockers are for, for hand baggage, although I agree if they are full, then they gave to go in the hold.

Because people who think they can take all their essentials for a week’s holiday as hand luggage cause delays boarding and getting off. Not sure how, if the baggage is within the dimensions are passengers are simply using the overhead lockers for what they're intended for.

Why does it matter? Because I worry my bag will go missing and I hate waiting at baggage reclaim.

@wowfudge I completely agree with you. Feels like we've gone full circle.

I'm now a travelling light convert, previously I packed everything but the kitchen sink!

Whenever I travel and they put a label on my hand luggage saying it needs to go in the hold, I sneakily remove it while nobody is looking, and just put it in the overhead locker (there’s always plenty of room). Naughty, yes, but bollocks to waiting an age for my luggage to appear after the flight.

I've done that before @DifficultSituation19 - I've heard if you're caught doing that, they can offload you, no idea if that's true though.

I've been worrying about this. What are the chances of them putting a small rucksack (which is also my handbag) into the hold, do you think? I haven't flown Easyjet for ages!

@SumAndSubstance I've only seen them do it with holdalls and small cases, but this has scuppered some passengers, who forget to get their passport out of the baggage before it went into the hold and then couldn't get through passport control at their destination.

"Because people who think they can take all their essentials for a week’s holiday as hand luggage cause delays boarding and getting off. "

I don't THINK I can take everything in hand luggage, I know I can. I'm currently in Tunisia for a week and I got 6 shorts, 6 T-shirt's, underwear, 4 dresses, a few bikinis, a towel, flip flops, cosmetics and 3x 100ml suncream into a case with room for souvenirs. I could have easily managed 10-14 days of clothes. So why should I book a hold case? They can take my carry on case to the hold if they must due to constraints but why would I BOOK a 15 kg massive hold case for £15-60 each way when I can travel light?

Do what I do - wait until the very end to board.

I've never ever had to check hand baggage

Re them allocating hand luggage to the hold when there are empty lockers - I can’t remember if it’s EasyJet or Jet2, but with one of them you can pay extra to guarantee your hand luggage won’t go into the hold - so if enough people have done this in advance then anyone else will automatically have their luggage stowed to ensure there’s enough space for those who paid (or, more cynically, to encourage you to cough up next time you fly)

I think it’s because what they really want is for passengers to have very small suitcases and to take them all the way to the plane themselves. This system accomplishes that. Saves weight, saves time baggage handling, loss less likely bc only possible at the arrival end. But If we know we are checking in a bag we use a bigger one.

A woman actually tried to move my handbag halfway down the plane to squeeze her luggage in on a recent flight

Why wasn’t your handbag underneath the seat in front of you?

@MyRaGaiaStarFishPieA May I ask a question? How do you get all your cosmetics / liquids in your hand luggage without the officials at the scanning desk removing them? I could definitely get a week's worth of essentials into a small 10kg case but I thought there was a restriction on liquids in hand luggage? There was when I flew last month ....

I hate waiting at baggage reclaim

I think that’s a really strong reaction to what is a first world problem. I hate being chronically ill and disabled. But to hate waiting for bags, that 99999 times out of 100000 arrive is rather strong. Maybe change your field of reference.

I think cordelia is correct. People are taking less. However people weigh more so the effect is similar.

“But that's what the overhead lockers are for, for hand baggage, although I agree if they are full, then they gave to go in the hold.”

The overhead lockers were designed for actual hand baggage, not for every passenger to have a wheelie case.

The dimensions given physically fit in the bins used by that airline, but that doesn’t mean they can fit in 100s of wheelie cases.

And even when people put a massive suitcase in the hold, they still insist on a case in the cabin, see them waiting at the carousel and then loading it all on trolleys.

And in the way home the Spanish airports (IME, maybe others) allow the cabin bag plus massive hold-all with extra stuff bought on holiday plus Duty Free bag etc etc. It’s unbearable, the cramming, the pushing forwards and back to where they have selfishly used a bin over someone else’s seats.

We flew Easyjet to Prague a couple of years ago. We got on through the back doors and our seats were about half way up the plane - took us nearly 15 minutes to get to them due to people faffing about putting bags and coats up, then having to get their phone/ipad/some other shit out of one, getting it all back down again, unloading, and repeating the process. I was feeling murderous by the time we actually sat down, and then had someone opposite who seemed to sat on a spring meaning they had to jump up every 5 minutes to rummage in the locker over our heads. I got so cross in the end that I asked him to swap seats with me as I was just waiting for something to drop on my head I personally think for safety reasons they should be locked by crew at takeoff, and opened again when the plane has landed safely. Would stop idiots taking stuff off in emergencies too.