Can a (slightly) damaged suitcase be used as checked luggage?

3/23/2017 4:22:22 PM

As Andrew said, it’s very unlikely that they’ll prevent you from checking it in.

I flew from the UK to Sweden last year. The suitcase I had was broken: the handle was locked in the topmost position, and it was impossible to “push it back” into the suitcase again.

The airline had me sign a waiver, saying that the suitcase was already damaged, and after that they checked it in without problems. Apart from you having to sign something like this, I don’t see any trouble with you checking in your luggage.

3/23/2017 5:27:11 PM

I flew from mainland France to Mayotte, last summer, and the Mahores have some interesting strategies for “cheap luggage”.

  • Many of them were using big coolers wrapped in plastic, for example.
  • Others had simple “bundles” of clothes also wrapped in plastic.
  • …

It was all very exotic, though all of them were sufficiently wrapped up to not have any loose bit hanging which I would expect the airline to be most concerned about (in case it catches into something).

3/23/2017 10:10:05 AM

I suspect you’ll have no trouble at all.

My wife & I recently flew to the US from the UK with a brand new (and very cheap) suitcase with a front zip-up pocket. It got to the US okay, but on the next (domestic US) leg of the journey, the front panel had been torn off – it was hanging by a scrap of fabric and the contents of the case were protected only by the inner lining of the bag. We patched it up with a lot of very obvious bright-blue duct tape, and you could see at a glance it had been repaired. As I recall, the airline didn’t even comment when we checked it back in for the flight home; it certainly got accepted okay.

The airline might want to make a note that it’s already damaged (in case you tried to claim for damage) but it seems very unlikely they’d refuse to carry it unless it looked totally unsound (eg tied up with a single bit of string) or if it might be unsafe for baggage handling machinery (or handlers). For example, imagine a roller suitcase where the extending handle is jammed “up” – and so it permanently has a two-foot metal pole sticking out of it. I can imagine an airline might reject this.

Credit:stackoverflow.com‘

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Hello,My name is Aparna Patel,I’m a Travel Blogger and Photographer who travel the world full-time with my hubby.I like to share my travel experience.

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