ise wrote:
I'm guessing neither of us has a copy of the Ryanair contract with their baggage handlers though )
I doubt staff receive receive a bonus but I'd imagine the handling agents receive a per transaction charge. In fact I doubt the check-in staff are Ryanair employees either.
What will actually be the case is they limit the baggage weight to reduce payload in the first instance. Extra bags or extra weight count as separate or extended transaction which their agent charge them for and they pass on.
Lets just say, that the uniformed staff (whoever they represented) I met at both Luton and Reus recently, were amazingly keen to issue excess baggage slips. The weighing scales were also somewhat over enthusiastic, and based on information supplied by Mitsubishi, doing the maths ) , my plain old Delsey rigid suitcase must weigh in at 6 kilos empty :lol:
The resulting charges for the outbound journey added 50% to the return flight costs. The check in scales on my airport return journey I saw go from 14.5 to 15 kg and back to 14.5kg with no external intervention.
There is good money to be made from excess baggage charges on the budget airlines, and there were many puzzled tourists at Reus trying to reconcile how their luggage could get heavier with less sun cream, shower gel, yada yada
I was prepared to chuck stuff out of my luggage, which would have been cheaper than pay the charges, which was not an option on my outward journey, as I had only 1 item in my case )
All UK airports have the 23kg baggage limit for H&S.