Strikes at Schiphol airport

[ICriedAllTheWayToTheChipShop]

I'm due to fly to Lima on 3rd October, going from Manchester via Amsterdam. I see that there's now another planned ground crew strike on 1st October, for 8 hours this time, and I'm starting to worry about knock-on effects. I've just been looking at the KLM Reddit and people seem to have been generally OK as long as their flights weren't on the actual strike day, but there have been some major problems with luggage not making it onto planes. This strike is much longer than the first couple and those caused a lot of disruption.

I'm just wondering if anyone on here has flown to, from or via Schiphol around the strike days and whether they've had issues? I was planning to check a bag in because I'm going for three weeks, but now I'm thinking it'd be safer to take a cabin bag and just do laundry in Peru!

KLM is a good airline with excellent customer service so you should be ok.

I flew back recently on a strike day. There was little impact. One early morning flight back cancelled, everything else was perfectly on time.

Strikes in mainland Europe are rarely all-out, so you'll probably be fine.

In any case I always assume that my luggage will be 24 hours late on any flight, strikes or not. Make sure your carry-on has a couple of changes of underwear etc.

And no issues luggage-wise?

I’m going to Lima on the 4th of October with KLM (ha!) and I’m not worried about the strikes. I recently flew through Amsterdam and it was all fine. I’m more worried about the new airport in Lima.

Oh and my luggage arrived fine at my onward destination

I went to Lima in August with KLM from LHR via Schiphol (KLM were excellent all round btw) @Junaluma, they hadn't long switched to the new terminal so I was a bit concerned but it was all fine. It didn't look "finished" with a lot of building going and weirdly a massive lack of seating at the gates given the amount of people waiting at them! Security & immigration were quick and efficient. Upon arrival we had to wait for ages for our bags but had AirTags in so we at least knew they had also arrived in Peru! Heather Jasper (she's got her own website and is definitely on insta) has uploaded some videos of the new airport and is worth checking out.

We did see a few people making onwards connections getting confused about the process so worth doing your research on that if you are going on somewhere. We stayed at the new Wyndham Grand at the terminal for ease as we were late in and had an early flight the next morning - very expensive for what it is (I got a deal on Expedia) but given all the dire warnings on traffic for Lima, we felt more comfortable staying there. When we returned to Lima later on in the holiday, I didn't think the traffic was that bad but we could just have been lucky.

Good luck @ICriedAllTheWayToTheChipShop, travelling can be stressful without added complications and I hope the problems at Machu Picchu are resolved if either of you are visiting

I am visiting Machu Picchu but I hadn't heard anything about any problems... things are really stacking up against me here! What problems are these?

I've looked into the Machu Picchu thing and apparently the bus contract has now been awarded to a local company for four months and the protesters have gone home. So I'm not going to worry about that for now!

I'm coming down on the side of cabin baggage and doing laundry. I just know myself and my tendency to worry about things that I can't control and that seems to be the best way to manage my anxieties.

Sorry @ICriedAllTheWayToTheChipShop I didn't mean to stress you out! Great news they have a resolution. Issues in Peru seem to be very under-reported in the UK, I only clocked this latest one as I'm still following various Peruvian people on insta. Worth signing up for the gov.uk travel updates though.

FWIW we did a lot of laundry in Peru as also travelled fairly light - I'd researched actual laundrettes but in the event our hotels were just as cheap (all done by the kilo), very efficient and could do a 3 hour turnaround in most places as required. It was an amazing country, you will have a fabulous time 💐