They weigh, you pay: Putting airport baggage scales to the test
SEATTLE -- If you are one of the nearly 300,000 passengers expected to travel through Sea-Tac Airport this Thanksgiving holiday season, and you plan to check bags, be prepared to open up your wallet, especially if your bags are overweight.
These days when baggage fees are more the norm than the exception, it's important that the scales are the airport are accurate.
But the KOMO Problems Solvers discovered some baggage scales at Sea-Tac Airport may be misreading the weight of your bag, possibly leading to an overweight fee you shouldn't have to pay.
Most domestic airlines servicing Sea-Tac charge $15 for the first bag and $25 for the second if you're not flying first-class. On Southwest Airlines, the first two bags are free.
But if your bag is overweight, watch out. All domestic airlines charge an additional overweight fee if the bag weighs more than 50 pounds and you're not flying first-class.
Virgin America starts charging if the bag weighs more than 70 pounds. AirTran has the lowest overweight fee of the major domestic airlines servicing Sea-Tac at $39 per bag. Alaska, American, Continental, Jet Blue, Southwest and U.S. Airways all charge $50. At Frontier, the fee is $75. Delta and Northwest charge $90.
Topping the list is United Airlines, weighing in at $125 for each bag over 50 pounds. So if you were checking two overweight bags on United, it would cost you $250 just for the bags.
Overweight fees are nothing new. Airlines have been charging them for years and if the bag weighs more than 100 pounds, the fees can go even higher.
But it wasn't until March of this year that inspectors with the Washington Department of Agriculture's Weights and Measures program took a close look at all of the airports scales.
"Once the airlines started to charge, we felt there was a need for us to go in there and just verify that they were accurate," said program manager Kirk Robinson.
State inspectors visited the airport on March 18 and tested roughly 180 scales use to weigh passenger bags. Included were scales at the ticket counters and at curbside check-in.
"We found about 30 percent of them to be either out of tolerance or have some issue that we should be concerned about," Robinson said.
Inspection documents obtained by KOMO showed the scales with issues were not limited to one particular airline. Some scales read as much as 20 pounds underweight favoring the passenger, while another scale read 11 pounds overweight favoring the airline. Several other scales fell somewhere in between. All of them were out of the state's tolerance range.
"In these cases, the maximum would be about half a pound that they could be over or under to be within tolerance," said Robinson.
Many of those scales were corrected on the spot with the help a contractor the Port of the Seattle uses to maintain the scales on a regular basis. Still others were taken out of service for being out of tolerance and other issues.
In September, Robinson says inspectors went back in and found most of the scales that were taken out of service had been fixed properly.
But we wanted to do our own follow-up.
We stuff a red Pullman suitcase with weights and clothing and took it to Washington State Metrologist Dan Wright, the state's official weights and measurements guy. With his help, we got our bag to weigh 50 and 1/1000 of a pound.
"An airport scale is not going to read that one-thousandth of a pound" said Wright.
We took our bag to Sea-Tac airport on two separate days during two different time periods and randomly asked airline agents if we could get a courtesy weight of our bag. No one turned us down.
It did not take long for us to discover a pattern.
The state requires the read out of all scales to be clearly visible to the passengers can see the weight of the bag, so it was easy for us to see what the scale was reading before and after we weighed our bag.
On 10 scales we randomly tested that displayed a digital read out of zero, our bag weighed exactly 50 pounds. The scale reset itself to zero after we removed our bag.
But there were several scales displaying a weight without anything on the scale.
At Continental Airlines, we spotted scales that read 2, 4.5 and 8.3 pounds before we placed our bag on the scale. With our 50 pound bag, those scales read 52, 54.5 and 58.3 pounds, respectively.
We told the Continental agent that we thought the scale showing 58.3 pounds was miss-weighing our bag. He then reached over and had to manually reset the scale. As soon as he did, our bag weighed 50 pounds, but he shouldn't have had to do that.
Robinson says his inspectors would immediately take a scale out of service if it didn't automatically reset to zero.
At American Airlines, we found several scales that were not starting out at zero, with one especially erratic scale. Before we placed our bag on it, the scale read 3.5 pounds without anything on it. With our 50-pound bag, the scale read 52.5 pounds. The scale then reset to 6 pounds overweight.
For the next twenty minutes we watched several passengers use that scale to weigh their bags and each time it did not reset to zero. The scale reset to 2.5 pounds overweight, to 5.5 pounds underweight and back to one pound overweight. We did not see anyone charged an overweight fee because it appeared nobody's bag was near 50 pounds.
We also found scales that favored the passenger. Several scales at Southwest Airlines were measuring minus one-half pound. On each of these scales our bag weighed 49.5 pounds. And a Delta airline scale showed a weight of minus six and our 50 pound bag weighed 44 pounds.
The Port of Seattle owns a majority of the scales at the airport. Port officials convinced the airlines several years ago to join in as group to use one contractor to calibrate and maintain the scales, according to spokesman Perry Cooper.
"We've been calibrating and maintaining our scales for several years before the state inspectors came in," Cooper said. "It's the airlines' responsibility to operate the scales properly and report a problem to us so we can have it fixed."
Continental Airlines is one of the few airlines at the airport that owns its own scales, but it uses the same contractor the rest of the airlines use to maintain the scales.
In response to our findings, Continental says their agents have been put on alert to watch out for problem scales.
"If a scale does not reset automatically to zero, our staff has been told to put that scale out of service" says Continental spokeswoman Mary Clark.
American Airlines was more defensive.
"Some scales can get clogged with dirt or debris and cause a misreading" said American spokesman Tim Smith. "There is no need to zero the scale every time for every customer if it is obvious to our agent it is not anywhere near the 50-pound limit."
Robinson says the state could levy fines if they find evidence a scale doesn't reset properly to zero and is repeatedly ignored by the airlines. He says he doesn't feel that will happen in case unless there is a steady flow of complaints from the public.
During our test, we never saw an airline agent take a scale that was not automatically resetting to zero out of service.
To avoid any confusion during these busy travel days, you may want to take a moment to make sure the scale that's weighing your bag starts at zero. Otherwise, it may cost you.
These days when baggage fees are more the norm than the exception, it's important that the scales are the airport are accurate.
But the KOMO Problems Solvers discovered some baggage scales at Sea-Tac Airport may be misreading the weight of your bag, possibly leading to an overweight fee you shouldn't have to pay.
Most domestic airlines servicing Sea-Tac charge $15 for the first bag and $25 for the second if you're not flying first-class. On Southwest Airlines, the first two bags are free.
But if your bag is overweight, watch out. All domestic airlines charge an additional overweight fee if the bag weighs more than 50 pounds and you're not flying first-class.
Virgin America starts charging if the bag weighs more than 70 pounds. AirTran has the lowest overweight fee of the major domestic airlines servicing Sea-Tac at $39 per bag. Alaska, American, Continental, Jet Blue, Southwest and U.S. Airways all charge $50. At Frontier, the fee is $75. Delta and Northwest charge $90.
Topping the list is United Airlines, weighing in at $125 for each bag over 50 pounds. So if you were checking two overweight bags on United, it would cost you $250 just for the bags.
Overweight fees are nothing new. Airlines have been charging them for years and if the bag weighs more than 100 pounds, the fees can go even higher.
But it wasn't until March of this year that inspectors with the Washington Department of Agriculture's Weights and Measures program took a close look at all of the airports scales.
"Once the airlines started to charge, we felt there was a need for us to go in there and just verify that they were accurate," said program manager Kirk Robinson.
State inspectors visited the airport on March 18 and tested roughly 180 scales use to weigh passenger bags. Included were scales at the ticket counters and at curbside check-in.
"We found about 30 percent of them to be either out of tolerance or have some issue that we should be concerned about," Robinson said.
Inspection documents obtained by KOMO showed the scales with issues were not limited to one particular airline. Some scales read as much as 20 pounds underweight favoring the passenger, while another scale read 11 pounds overweight favoring the airline. Several other scales fell somewhere in between. All of them were out of the state's tolerance range.
"In these cases, the maximum would be about half a pound that they could be over or under to be within tolerance," said Robinson.
Many of those scales were corrected on the spot with the help a contractor the Port of the Seattle uses to maintain the scales on a regular basis. Still others were taken out of service for being out of tolerance and other issues.
In September, Robinson says inspectors went back in and found most of the scales that were taken out of service had been fixed properly.
But we wanted to do our own follow-up.
We stuff a red Pullman suitcase with weights and clothing and took it to Washington State Metrologist Dan Wright, the state's official weights and measurements guy. With his help, we got our bag to weigh 50 and 1/1000 of a pound.
"An airport scale is not going to read that one-thousandth of a pound" said Wright.
We took our bag to Sea-Tac airport on two separate days during two different time periods and randomly asked airline agents if we could get a courtesy weight of our bag. No one turned us down.
It did not take long for us to discover a pattern.
The state requires the read out of all scales to be clearly visible to the passengers can see the weight of the bag, so it was easy for us to see what the scale was reading before and after we weighed our bag.
On 10 scales we randomly tested that displayed a digital read out of zero, our bag weighed exactly 50 pounds. The scale reset itself to zero after we removed our bag.
But there were several scales displaying a weight without anything on the scale.
At Continental Airlines, we spotted scales that read 2, 4.5 and 8.3 pounds before we placed our bag on the scale. With our 50 pound bag, those scales read 52, 54.5 and 58.3 pounds, respectively.
We told the Continental agent that we thought the scale showing 58.3 pounds was miss-weighing our bag. He then reached over and had to manually reset the scale. As soon as he did, our bag weighed 50 pounds, but he shouldn't have had to do that.
Robinson says his inspectors would immediately take a scale out of service if it didn't automatically reset to zero.
At American Airlines, we found several scales that were not starting out at zero, with one especially erratic scale. Before we placed our bag on it, the scale read 3.5 pounds without anything on it. With our 50-pound bag, the scale read 52.5 pounds. The scale then reset to 6 pounds overweight.
For the next twenty minutes we watched several passengers use that scale to weigh their bags and each time it did not reset to zero. The scale reset to 2.5 pounds overweight, to 5.5 pounds underweight and back to one pound overweight. We did not see anyone charged an overweight fee because it appeared nobody's bag was near 50 pounds.
We also found scales that favored the passenger. Several scales at Southwest Airlines were measuring minus one-half pound. On each of these scales our bag weighed 49.5 pounds. And a Delta airline scale showed a weight of minus six and our 50 pound bag weighed 44 pounds.
The Port of Seattle owns a majority of the scales at the airport. Port officials convinced the airlines several years ago to join in as group to use one contractor to calibrate and maintain the scales, according to spokesman Perry Cooper.
"We've been calibrating and maintaining our scales for several years before the state inspectors came in," Cooper said. "It's the airlines' responsibility to operate the scales properly and report a problem to us so we can have it fixed."
Continental Airlines is one of the few airlines at the airport that owns its own scales, but it uses the same contractor the rest of the airlines use to maintain the scales.
In response to our findings, Continental says their agents have been put on alert to watch out for problem scales.
"If a scale does not reset automatically to zero, our staff has been told to put that scale out of service" says Continental spokeswoman Mary Clark.
American Airlines was more defensive.
"Some scales can get clogged with dirt or debris and cause a misreading" said American spokesman Tim Smith. "There is no need to zero the scale every time for every customer if it is obvious to our agent it is not anywhere near the 50-pound limit."
Robinson says the state could levy fines if they find evidence a scale doesn't reset properly to zero and is repeatedly ignored by the airlines. He says he doesn't feel that will happen in case unless there is a steady flow of complaints from the public.
During our test, we never saw an airline agent take a scale that was not automatically resetting to zero out of service.
To avoid any confusion during these busy travel days, you may want to take a moment to make sure the scale that's weighing your bag starts at zero. Otherwise, it may cost you.