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Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

japannews.yomiuri.co.jp

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Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#41

Post by ghaff »

bombcar wrote: post #36
ghaff wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Permanent losses are pretty uncommon in general. Good for them for minimizing but having bags on the next flight or delayed for a couple/three days is way more common. Probably would have to be stolen which is rare, especially in Japan, I assume or end up in some weird location without a scan. Was flying into Narita once and I had checked luggage in part because I was carrying an award for a Japanese customer. I was…

Most of the "permanent losses" are because the passenger gives up or doesn't care terribly much - hence all the luggage at the airline outlet stores. Most airlines do eventually find the bag, and if you kept in touch they'll usually even get it to where you are, even if you've since returned.

I honestly have no idea how those dynamics work. At some point, the airline presumably pays, travel insurance does, or a combination of the two. At some point if it's just a bunch of old travel stuff, I guess I can see a customer shrugging, collecting the money, and dropping the whole thing.

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#42

Post by psadauskas »

afavour wrote: post #20
jakub_g wrote: post #16

> In early December, a 35-year-old passenger from Tanzania was impressed to see that all the handles of the suitcases on the conveyor belt in the baggage claim area were facing the passengers. > After the luggage is unloaded and collected in the cargo handling area upon arrival at the airport, ground support personnel manually align the handles of the bags and place them on the conveyor belt. That's a level of attent…

I think it also highlights something: better things are possible. Zero lost suitcases doesn't require magic to achieve. It just requires enough workers or enough time to make sure each worker is able to do their job successfully. Unfortunately financial and time constraints mean that very often there aren't enough workers or enough time, and some passengers suffer.

> financial and time constraints

What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job.

Its like the news reports that say "an officers weapon was discharged and someone died at the scene", rather than "a cop shot and killed a guy".

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#43

Post by hodgesrm »

psadauskas wrote: post #42
afavour wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it also highlights something: better things are possible. Zero lost suitcases doesn't require magic to achieve. It just requires enough workers or enough time to make sure each worker is able to do their job successfully. Unfortunately financial and time constraints mean that very often there aren't enough workers or enough time, and some passengers suffer.

> financial and time constraints What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job. Its like the news reports that say "an officers weapon was discharged and someone died at the scene", rather than "a cop shot and killed a guy".

> What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job.

This is a very limited view of why things don't work. The main issue in my experience is whether the company values the outcome and ensures focus on optimizing for it. That can include everything from adequate staffing to comp to training to management focus. (A lot of the last one.)

You can spend a huge amount of money and still get a crappy outcome. US healthcare provides a rich field of examples.

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#44

Post by psadauskas »

afavour wrote: post #34
rectang wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should be spreading our cynicism over both management and customers. There is almost no level of service so terrible that people won't buy cheaper airline tickets. Let alone losing luggage, you could dial up the risk of death and people would still buy the cheaper tickets.

There's also something about the collapse in civility. Or... something. If you asked a plane full of passengers if they'd be happy to get their suitcase 5 minutes earlier even though it meant someone else lost theirs a lot of them would say yes.

I think we can lay the blame for this on the wealthy elites, too. When people see someone better off than them greedily destroying society for their own personal gain, they naturally think "well why not me, too?".

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#45

Post by observationist »

gmd63 wrote: post #30
afavour wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it also highlights something: better things are possible. Zero lost suitcases doesn't require magic to achieve. It just requires enough workers or enough time to make sure each worker is able to do their job successfully. Unfortunately financial and time constraints mean that very often there aren't enough workers or enough time, and some passengers suffer.

Also requires a culture of respect for the people who are handling baggage - an important thing lacking in parts of society in the US, where working fast food is used as a pejorative.

The culture bit is the most important. You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will.

The TSA is security theater, a vast majority of American jobs seem to be competence theater. You only ever tend to see care and craft in small business and actual crafts. It's so rare that it's incredibly refreshing to find anyone in any business that bothers to do good work and take care of the small things.

It's not about respecting the baggage handlers. It's about a culture where you respect yourself such that you are obliged to do the best work you can, whether it's baggage handling, being a CEO, or flipping burgers. Self respect and respect for the job far outweigh any notion of employers or other citizens respecting baggage handlers. They have sophisticated notions of status and face and place in society that are sadly absent in American culture.

You could take the Kansai airport baggage handler team and drop them into any airline in the world, and they'd perform to the same high standard. Take any halfass United Airline baggage team and drop them at Kansai and they'd be breaking guitars, killing dogs, and all the other usual shenanigans just like back at home, and they wouldn't give a flying rat's behind about how their employer respects them or not. They're there for paychecks. Respect doesn't even enter into consideration.

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#46

Post by rectang »

gib444 wrote: post #29
jakub_g wrote: post #16

> In early December, a 35-year-old passenger from Tanzania was impressed to see that all the handles of the suitcases on the conveyor belt in the baggage claim area were facing the passengers. > After the luggage is unloaded and collected in the cargo handling area upon arrival at the airport, ground support personnel manually align the handles of the bags and place them on the conveyor belt. That's a level of attent…

[flagged]

In the airplane industry, KPIs and beancounting are just a response to a mindbendingly price-driven marketplace — to the extent that consumers need to be protected by regulations from flying in unsafe planes.

I agree that there's an issue about western capitalism, but I don't think it's in the tension between middle management and craftspeople who take pride in their work. I think the problems arise at a higher level, with the modern-day aristocracy of the capitalist ownership class and the slice of the pie that they capture.

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#47

Post by apetresc »

adrian_b wrote: post #23

When traveling to Japan, I did not have the slightest problem with lost baggage, either at airports, or with the Japanese services that allow you to send your baggage from one hotel to another, to be able to travel more lightly. However, at the airport, when flying back home I had an unexpected experience. At my final destination, when I retrieved my checked baggage in the airport, it no longer had the padlock that i…

Why would a knife be a problem in a checked bag, even if it hadn't been sealed in the original package?

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#49

Post by lostlogin »

observationist wrote: post #45
gmd63 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also requires a culture of respect for the people who are handling baggage - an important thing lacking in parts of society in the US, where working fast food is used as a pejorative.

The culture bit is the most important. You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will. The TSA is security theater, a vast majori…

> You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will.

This places the blame solely on the workers. Their CEO earns a ludicrous multiple of their wage. They are treated like shit and are expendable. It’s a two way street, treat workers with respect and and you might get some respect from them.

Re: Osaka: Kansai Airport proud to have never lost single piece of luggage (2024)

#50

Post by fsckboy »

EuanReid wrote: post #5

Headline's a bit misleading. They've never permanently lost a bag, and well done to them for that, but they've certainly lost them for periods of time. Just eventually found them.

the article does not discuss what you are saying, do you have an alternative source that tells this true story?
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