Retrieving Baggage in India

When we left London to come to India, we were told that our overall weight was too much. They weren't telling us we were fat, just that we had too much heavy baggage. Our only option was to have one of our suitcases shipped to Chennai through the airport shipping service. Basically they take your suitcase, shrink wrap it, and send it on some other flight in the next couple of weeks (for a fairly large price). That meant one of our suitcases would arrive in Chennai a week or two after we did. I didn't think this would be a big deal. We had enough to get us by in our other suitcases, so having one show up a couple weeks later would be no big deal. I assumed we would just go down to the Chennai airport, go to some counter somewhere, show them our receipt, and they would give us the suitcase. But this is India, and things don't quite work that way.

I did receive a confirmation email about a week later, letting me know what flight it was on and when to expect it. It was getting in on a Sunday, so I sent on the info to Mohan, the Amnet office manager. Mohan is basically the guy at Amnet who gets things done for you. He made contact with the people there and was going to accompany me to where we needed to go to get my bag. We left around 11:00am and went to a building really close to the office. I was thinking that my bag must have been taken to this office, which was great because maybe it wouldn't take more than 15 minutes to get it. Mohan chatted with some people there, I filled out some paperwork, the lady fillout out some paperwork, I filled out some more paperwork, then Mohan said we had to go. Apparently, we just needed to fill out some forms here, and my bag was still at the airport somewhere.

We went to the luggage and shipping area of the airport. Mohan talked to someone at the gate who wouldn't let us in, then we went to some booth where Mohan talked to someone else. Basically, he learned that security was not going to let him in, just me. He had them bring over an agent who would help me through the process. Before leaving me to the care of this agent, Mohan instructed me to give my agent 500 Rupees (about $11 US), but "not until you have the suitcase".

My agent took me inside the luggage/shiping complex (we were still outside in the humid 93 degree temperatures) and filled out some paperwork for me, occasionally stopping to ask me for some information which usually took him asking 3 or 4 times before I would finally get what he wanted. After filling this out, we went to a desk where he gave someone this paperwork. I had to sign something else, and was given a "visitor's pass" that allowed me inside the luggage/shipping areas. Then we went to another counter where my agent handed off my paperwork and talked with the lady behind the counter. She eventually gave us some more paperwork which we took back across the grounds to another counter to hand to someone else.

This went on for quite a while. In fact, we visited about 14 different counters all throughout this large shipping area. At some counters, my agent would instruct me to give the person behind the counter 100 Rupees. I'm not entirely sure, but I think I might have been bribing people to make things move faster. At some of the counters, he would say "sit" and motion to a crowded waiting area where I would take a seat and wait for a while for someone to return with some more paperwork. Eventually, we went to an area filled with luggage and boxes. He pointed at a black suitcases and asked, "yours?" It wasn't, so we kept looking, eventually finding it and matching its tracking number to some number in one of our many papers.

I didn't get my suitcase then, however. After locating it, we went back to one of the counters, where I was told to "sit" and wait again. While waiting here, I noticed a large sign on the wall that said, "Instructions for Retrieving Unaccompanied Baggage". There were about 15 steps underneath it (I wish I had my camera with me), things like, "Fill out form 190EB", "Take form 190EB to Luggage AI counter", "Fill out form AI982", "Take form AI982 to Internal shipping counter", and so on. Basically, it was the steps my agent had been guiding me through.

I eventually did get my bag. What I assumed would involve going to one counter in an airport and showing them a receipt, instead involved about two hours of walking around in the hot sun, filling out random forms in compeltely separate sections of the area, and waiting in stuffy, crowded waiting rooms. I guess that's how things are done here. Before taking me back to the gate, my agent asked me for the money. He didn't ask for 500 Rupees though...he asked for 1000. His reason for this was because he got me through "very fast". I only gave him the 500, but I hate to think how long it would have taken if it wasn't "very fast".