Tale of Two Laptop Bags

I was travelling from Nagpur to Chennai via Bangalore   on Jetlite recently  with my family. We had a lady passenger who sat on the same row.  We had a stopover at Mumbai, where the passengers proceeding to Bangalore were asked to stay on the flight . An Airhostess alerts all the passengers proceeding to Bangalore to check on their belongings and Hand Carry Luggage to be identified by each passenger to the Security staff on the transit. The lady who was on our row, then realised her Laptop has been picked by the other passenger who deplaned at Mumbai leaving his on our plane (case of Mistaken Identity).

The lady asks the Cabin crew head to alert their ground staff to help  recover her laptop bag. To our surprise the cabin crew asked her to go to the arrival hall and do it on her own, she boarded the bus to the arrival hall and I believe she had to run from pillar to post to find about the whereabouts of her Laptop. Finally, she managed to get hold of the person who was having her laptop after about 45 mins , but she couldn’t get through on the phone to that gentleman as he had boarded another flight to his destination. In spite of her requests to the ground staff, they were never not ready to help her citing Security reasons in getting hold of the man who was having her laptop . With all these commotion behind her, she had to leave the arrival hall to board the flight which was to depart to Bangalore; she was one of the last passengers to board the aircraft.

Back in the aircraft, she was furious on herself and the ground staff for not being so cooperative. With few minutes for the take-off, she gets a call from the gentleman who was having her laptop; he was departing in a Jet Airways flight which was just about 50 meters to our right. She again makes request to the cabin crew to help her get her laptop from the other plane which is still on the tarmac , Now our cabin crew staffs point blank denied  her request saying it’s now a security issue as we are about to push off for departure and can’t do anything. She continues her conversation with gentleman making alternate plans to get their laptops, I happen to sit near the window and my wife suddenly spots a ground support staff  from the other Aircraft , running towards our flight waving his hand to the pilot to stop and to ground support staff of our plane not to remove the ladder, while carrying the laptop bag in his other hand.  So all ended well with each one getting their laptops back!! The lady was lucky that the other passenger who mistakenly took her laptop was also transiting.

On the whole issue I found the cabin crew of our plane were not very cooperative to the plight of the passenger. With the numerous passengers travelling on a day trip for their businesses, I could imagine the plight of not having your own laptop. A simple communication through their support staff could have solved the issue. The airlines nowadays have a smoke screen in the name of Security to ward off the passengers requests, compromising on the service .  If the security was the issue I am still wondering how the gentleman from other plane could send the laptop to this plane through the support staff ??