What to do if…
your checked bag is missing and you have lost your bag tag receipt

What to do now

1. File the mishandled baggage report now and get the file number.
   At the airport, go to the airline baggage desk or baggage service office in the baggage-claim area. If you have already left, use the airline’s official delayed or missing baggage form.

2. Tell the airline clearly that the bag tag receipt is missing.
   Give your full name, flight number, date of travel, route, confirmation code, ticket number if you have it, and any boarding pass or app record. Ask them to search their check-in and baggage records for the missing bag-tag number.

3. Check for any digital trace of the bag tag.
   Look in the airline app, your email, wallet app, kiosk receipt, text messages, and screenshots. Search terms such as “bag tag,” “baggage receipt,” “checked bag,” “receipt,” and the airline name.

4. Give a detailed bag description that does not rely on the tag.
   Include the brand, size, colour, hard or soft shell, wheels, straps, stickers, scuffs, locks, ribbons, and a photo if you have one. Add a few distinctive contents only if you can describe them calmly and honestly.

5. Set a delivery plan you can actually receive.
   Give a reliable address, such as a hotel front desk, trusted contact, workplace reception, or home address. Add a reachable phone number and ask whether ID or a signature is needed.

6. Save proof as you go.
   Keep the file number, screenshots of the report, airline messages, delivery updates, boarding passes, receipts, and the names or locations of airline staff you spoke with.

7. If you need essentials, keep purchases reasonable and keep receipts.
   DOT guidance says airlines must compensate passengers for reasonable, verifiable, actual incidental expenses while bags are delayed, subject to liability limits. Airlines are not allowed to set an arbitrary daily cap for those interim expenses.

8. If you paid a checked-bag fee, ask about the refund process after the report is filed.
   DOT rules say a checked-bag fee refund is due if the bag is declared lost or is significantly delayed, and a mishandled baggage report must be on file. A bag is significantly delayed if it is not delivered within 12 hours after arrival for a domestic flight; for an international flight between a U.S. airport and a foreign airport, the threshold is 15 hours if the flight was 12 hours or less, or 30 hours if the flight was more than 12 hours. The clock generally starts when you are given the opportunity to deplane at your final destination and ends when you pick up the bag or it is delivered to the location you and the airline agreed on. Once the delay crosses those thresholds, ask the airline how the refund will be issued.