A woman whose luggage was lost on a Tui trip to Spain was told the airline didn’t know where it was – but she managed to track it down herself.
Laura Simpson, 35, flew from Manchester to Menorca for a week with her family, but her group arrived missing seven suitcases containing clothes, toiletries and important medication.
She said she spent hours on the phone to Tui but did not find out what had happened to her things.
That changed when she spotted a news report showing photos of dozens of suitcases lined up at Manchester airport.
Laura claims she was able to identify all seven of the missing bags – but still hasn’t been reunited with them.
She posted on Facebook: ‘When Manchester Evening News do a better job at finding your luggage than TUI… 43 seconds into the clip and there are all of our seven suitcases. Day five into the holiday with nothing and no communication.’
It was not the only issue with the trip, as the mum-of-one said the flight on May 27 was meant to be direct but she was told the day before she would have to go via Ibiza due to ‘technical issues’.
‘The flight took off about an hour-and-a-half late. When we got to Ibiza everyone got off and the 25 of us going to Menorca remained onboard.
‘Passengers started getting on who were going back to Manchester, who were then told we’d be diverting via Menorca.
‘It was all over the place. By this point we’d already waited for two hours on a hot plane.’
After arriving at the Balearic island of Menorca and waiting an hour for their luggage, they then found that it hadn’t arrived.
She said Tui had given them €25 a day per suitcase, but this wasn’t getting them far as swimsuit alone cost €45 there, the MEN reported.
‘One of the children needs an inhaler and skin cream if he has a flare up. His parents took the bare minimum of what they needed in hand luggage but if he does have a flare up the stuff that would stop him needing to go to hospital is in the suitcase,’ she added.
A spokesperson for TUI said in a statement: ‘We’re aware that some customers have been impacted by baggage delays at Manchester Airport and we’d like to thank customers for their patience and understanding at this exceptionally busy time.
‘We’re working closely with airport staff, baggage handlers and our teams in resort to ensure customers receive their luggage as soon as possible. We’ll be in direct contact with customers once we have more information to share.’
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