I know there is some older threads but looking for current advice and frankly I lack experience of jetting off with my bike…

Bike to south of France. BA allow 50lb checked bag + hand lugguage (Also 50lb?) allowed. From what I understand, the bike in a bike bag can count as checked bagguage but given my bike is 35lb and the bag is 10lb+ plus I should book ahead the bike at an additional cost each way…sound right?

If I pay extra for the bike bag, that means I still have my checked baggage allowance free so can take additional?

BA allow you to take a bagged bike as part (or all if it’s heavy enough) of your luggage allowance. IIRC this is 23kg for Economy. On the Euro routes, they work on total weight rather than number of pieces so anything over your 23kg limit can be charged. On the US routes, they charge by the piece (again IIRC). Hand luggage is not usually weighed unless you’re obviously taking the pi$$. They’ll usually restrict by size rather than weight.

So get the heavy stuff in you man bag, keep it within the size limits and get your boik plus gear below 23kg. Job done. BTW, I used a CTC poly bag last time I flew a bike with BA. It weighed a lot less that 10lb.

We flew to spain in october with BA & seriously struggled with the 23kg weight limit (36lb bike, 2kg bike bag)problem is heavy stuff you want to put in hand luggage is concidered ‘dangerous’ so has to go in bike bag. We ended up booking one additional piece of checked in luggage between the four of us to meet the weight limits but that cost us another £18 each. If you had a light weight xc bike you’d be ok with 23kg limit.

message back from my contact at BA

Yep, with ur ticket u have one hold baggage allowance of 23kg (or ur old school 50lb) and u can take one hand baggage piece to that weight plus a smaller hand baggage laptop-bag-size item.
Your bike will count as one piece of checked baggage, so if u will be checking in a holdall/suitcase AND ur bike u’ll need to pre-pay for an extra item. With each item u pay for u get an extra 23kg/50lb….

they work on total weight rather than number of pieces so anything over your 23kg limit can be charged

This doesn’t sound good.

problem is heavy stuff you want to put in hand luggage is concidered ‘dangerous’ so has to go in bike bag.

Yeah, exactly.

Thanks for the advice all.

Sounds like it better to pay for additional baggage rather than risk it. If you buy tickets online, do just phone up and add the additional? Anyone know the likely cost?

I regularly fly with 2 bags – ba tried to charge me 25 quid each leg on a 4 leg flight once when checking in online , managed to barter them down to 25 quid all in on the strength of how much business we do with them when i got to the airport.

Turkmen air charged me 4 dollar for the same two bags

ba tried to charge me 25 quid each leg on a 4 leg flight once when checking in online

So you don’t ‘book’ the additional item of baggage at the time of booking the tickets but when you check-in/turn up?

Yes thats what i do , but im taking 2 11kg bags not 2 x23 kg bags

Sounds like it better to pay for additional baggage rather than risk it. If you buy tickets online, do just phone up and add the additional? Anyone know the likely cost?

If you buy a BA ticket online you will get an e-mail confirmation which has a “Manage My Booking” link. Click on that and you get various options including buying an extra luggage allowance. I was charged £34 for Glasgow-Heathrow-San Diego and the same for the two leg return flight. THe charge may be less for shorter flights I’m not sure.

You can also pay the extra at the airport though it is slightly more. For me it would be £40 each way.

Just a suggestion – if you can get some relatively cheap business class tickets with BA, you can take two pieces of checked baggage up to 32kg each. Your bike can be one of them, size is irrelevant. You’ll also be able to use the lounges on departure for free food/drink and get fed and watered properly on the aeroplane. Nothing to pay in the way of extra charges for the bike.

Don’t bikes fall under a sporting goods category anymore? Wasn’t with BA but the last time I took a bike on a plane (4 years ago, so could be wrong now) as long as the bag was less than 32kg (health and safety maximum allowable) you just paid a flat fee if you prebooked and said it was sports kit rather than just extra swimming trunks. IIRC it was £15 each way.

Don’t bikes fall under a sporting goods category anymore? Wasn’t with BA but the last time I took a bike on a plane (4 years ago, so could be wrong now) as long as the bag was less than 32kg (health and safety maximum allowable) you just paid a flat fee

Yes they are sporting goods but the charge is still as an extra item of checked baggage. So for transatlantic flights on an economy ticket (World Traveller) you need to pay the £34 each way charge. More expensive tickets are allowed 2 checked bags so there would be no bike charge.

Could be worse American Airlines for example are $150 per bike unless it packs down into a standard size suitcase as part of your normal baggage allowance.

If your flight was with another airline then charges/baggage rules will have been different.