More than an hour to get baggage back, people camped out and desperate: what we found Sunday at Malpensa T2
A sea of tanned heads, arms, legs after returning from vacation. Between 300 and 400 people. Who [...]
easyJet
MXP
A sea of tanned heads, arms, legs after returning from vacation. Between 300 and 400 people. Some sitting on the floor, some standing, some lying down (yes, lying down) on the baggage claim belts. It was this, Late in the evening of Sunday, Aug. 10, the atmosphere in the arrivals-baggage claim lounge at Malpensa Terminal 2.
In this article:
Third-world stuff on a peak day of the peak summer season. Reason for the crush? I Biblical times for the return of luggage to passengers, all above an hour's wait from the time the flights arrive. But with peaks of an hour and a quarter and more.
Which then, to say third-world stuff is about as unfair as it gets, because anyone who has traveled to the crowded airports of the so-called 'third world' will have experienced truly satisfactory waiting times for suitcases. Instead, it should be said. 'Malpensa stuff,' since the Milan airport has always been infamous for long waits at the tapes, as much at Terminal 2 (easyJet's) as at Terminal 1.
Throning to the 'shame' of Sunday night, for example, passengers who landed from Olbia at 8:50 p.m. did not see their bags again until 9:45 p.m., which means that Spent more time waiting for baggage than they did in flight. Those landed from Gatwick at 9:37 p.m., by 10:19 p.m. they still had not received anything. Worse went to those from Lisbon, who waited over an hour and were able to get their luggage back when the writing had already disappeared from the screen above the belt. Barely better went to those from Catania who landed at 9:40 p.m.
What was even more shameful was the fact that in the whole hall there was not a single representative of the handling company, so much so that people, in desperation, turned to the Guardia di Finanza officers on site and asked if there was any strike.
Yeah, because as many of the readers of The Flight Club probably know but the vast majority of passengers don't, is that the airline has no direct responsibility for baggage handling (check-in, dispatch to the hold, pickup on the apron, return to the belts). In fact, each carrier uses a specialized handling company.
In the case of easyJet, this is, at Malpensa, AGS Handling, which has been operating at Terminal 2 since 2023 with Menzies, a British handling company with which easyJet has worked for many years. Surely, today, the low-cost carrier's Italian top management will have moved to check what happened on Sunday evening. But the explanations can only be as follows: too many people on vacation or leave at the same time, or too many people on sick leave, and therefore too few workers present to handle the luggage.
There are a total of three handling operators at Malpensa: Aviapartner, Airport Handling and AGS Handling. And the companies serving the airport must choose one of these three companies.
