Hold Baggage

[Paula Perfect]

My partner and I are travelling with Thomas cook airlines to hurghada march 2018 and we like to take our own equipment , however on checking the TC website it says sport equipment baggage is charged at £80 per 20kg I have already paid for a Normal hold baggage case 20kg £50 and wondered if I could just pay for another case for our gear instead of declaring it as sport equipment and paying the extra £30.
Can anyone advise me please whether this would be possible as I don't want to incur problems at check in
Thanks in advance

 

[JamesBon92007]

I'm only familiar with airlines in North and Central America but I usually put my scuba equipment in my carry-on luggage and it's not a problem with the regulations here. Lately I have been bringing a "hold" bag (we call it a "checked bag") containing some additional gear but I've never had to pay anything other than the normal fees, which is usually about $25-$30 USD. 80 pounds is a LOT! If I'm not mistaken that is about $113 USD. Even 50 pounds is a lot. If some gear (here) is oversize it can still be taken onboard but checked in separately so hopefully that is what they are referring to. Our airline weight limits are similar to yours (20kg or 50 lbs).

 

[Damselfish]

My reply might not be relevant since I don't know about that airline (or your airlines in general.) But lots of airlines in the US have had something in their rules referring to sports or scuba gear, declaring it and paying more. Feels like these things were originally written in the early days of airlines or scuba by someone who didn't really know much about it and thought everyone brought tanks, was thinking about weird oversize things, or it needing special handling, or something. Who knows? (And that was back in the day most airlines, in the US at least, allowed 2x70# checked bags and weren't trying to make their money off luggage fees.)

Most people's feeling is if they have a normal travel bag of some sort within size/weight limits, who cares what's in it? I've never seen or heard of someone (anywhere in the world) declaring they have scuba gear in their bags, or an airline asking. Security may know/care what's in bags, but for different reasons - and they're not the airline or charging for stuff. Personally, my gear and clothes are always mixed together in both hold and carryon luggage, with clothing protecting the gear, and I would never have a separate bag.

 

[Damselfish]

I should add, there are very occasional airlines that will give an extra baggage allowance for scuba or sometimes other sports gear, free or for a modest fee. Then you might tell them.