a worth while purchase would be a set of fishing scales off ebay for a couple of quid they are very useful i have them in my apartment for guest to use and have had very positive feedback from customers

I have just brought some luggage scales from betterware for £6.99,they wont be catching us out

john i bought some digital scales off ebay and im very pleased with them , everytime we go away im always worried about the weight of our cases as i buy so much

when are you off to istanbul ?

A friend of mine suggested that we weigh our luggage on the kids Nintendo Wii - of course that will only help on our outward journey. Just have to leave a couple of kilos spare for our purchases when we get there!

This is fast becoming a gripe with many tourists. Nearly all airlines are now charging anything from £16 for the benefit of taking a suitcase on holiday. Did you incur excess charges for bringing too much back or was it as a result of changes introduced by your airline/tour operator ?

Please have a look through the pages of this thread regarding information on the charging of excess baggage. It's a commoin question and cause of complaint. This is nothing new and is not limited to Dalaman. Over the years, airlines have allowed passengers to get away with a ferw extra kg's of luggage. However, with the current economic climate and many airlines struggling to stay in the black, they are very strict these days on excess luggage and will charge you if you are over, even slightly over. The current rate is £8-10 per kg, but this varies between airlines. This has nothing to do with Dalaman airport or their staff. The check-in agents are employees of a local ground handling companies (Celebi) who are appointed by airlines to administer check-in procedures locally. They are acting on instruction of airlines. It is therefore airlines that are charging you for excess baggage, not the airport. This has been discussed many times on this thread. Many people, including myself now travel with a set of compact luggage scales to weigh suitcases before setting off for the airport, this is particulary prevelent for the inbound flight. More details on luggage scales here. This is recommended practice for any destination, not just Turkey or Dalaman airport.

olwenjlangford,

It very much depends on the airline you are travelling with. Many charter / scheduled airlines will have a standard luggage allowance. If you are travelling with a low cost airline, they often charger extra for checked-in luggage. You have to bear in mind you'll often be paying a lower price for the initial ticket so have to take the whole cost of the flight / holiday in to consideration.

Darren

T J Hughes are currently selling luggage/fishing scales at £4.99 each.

Steve

I bought my scales in Marmaris for 2.5 lira two years ago and they are still going strong.

I bought the digital luggage scales and used them in October,they were spot on.A friend of ours who came on holiday to Turkey with us last year is a science teacher,and he said that your beach towels can weigh a kilo each more after a 2 week holiday with all the salt in them etc,so have them laundered before you come home or throw them away!!

Crispy wrote:

he said that your beach towels can weigh a kilo each

I would doubt they would weight that much more on their own, but certainly items in the suitcase collectively could do with humidity (dampness), sand, salt etc. 1kg of salt is a pretty big bag!

Darren

Sorry I worded that wrong,meant to say if you have good quality beach towels,with the added salt,sand etc,they can end up weighing one kilo each at the end of a 2 week holiday,I stand corrected.

The thing about the weights is though unless you find them at the right price, id rather keep the money and spend it on that extra kg, and i have never had these charges incured (touch wood)!!, it seems that the check in agents cant be bothered once it gets round to it, because we always have a heavy sticker on

I also think it depends on the check in clerk, flew with Jet2 last year and ended up checking in as 2 different parties as we had booked seperatly prob could of done it all together but anyway, our familly checked in on the desk next to us and were more over then we were because they checked the scales and the clerk just put them through without a word.

Steve

As I mentioned previously, the check-in agents are acting under instruction from the airlines. Some airlines have stricter policies than others. For example, Thomas Cook have a very strict policy and will charge even if your party is only 1 kg over. Onur Air is less strict and will give a party of couple of kg's grace before charging. It used to be at the descretion of the agent, but that's less of a factor these days and more instruction of the airline.

Darren

It wont be long before you have to get weighed when checking in so they can charge you for over weight.As a joke I put on this web site that Thomsonfly would soon start charging to go to the toilet,seems someone at Ryanair must have read it??

qatarman,

The weighing of passengers does actually occur!! On weight critical aircraft such as small-medium sized helicopters, it's standard practice to weight passengers in order to ensure the aircraft isn't overweight. Don't be putting ideas in to Michael O'Leary's head, he'll be announcing it next week along with flight to Dalaman

Darren

Hi All,

Ive not had a chance to read all replys to this topic but read a good few pages and Im not supprised but it brought back my frustration with regards to this situation and put a wee damper on my holiday spirits :-(

I think my experience has to be one of the worse, me and my family were unquestionably victoms of theft at Dalaman.

Firstly we (me and hubby) paid for excess luggage just in case before we left (birmingham) with our airline (TC) as did my dad + wife. When all of our luggage was weighed, not together but seperatley we were all a few kg under the max allowance. When in turkey we bought NOTHING, not one thing, NADA!! (sounds tight but we had our honeymoon a few weeks prior and bought our family presents then so genuinly took nothing extra back). Infact we ditched our beach towells (looked shabby), shampoo, lotion etc so the cases were lighter. My dad and his wife bought two pairs of jeans each but this would probably just counter act there lotion etc which they ditched.

So on checking in we wanted to sit together so my dad took all 4 of our passports and checked us in, the guy behind the desk took all the luggage and wrote the boarding passes etc out and then on returning our passports said between the 4 of us we were 9kg over weight!! and asked for £100! we obviously replied with there is no way we are overweight, double check the bags! they said the bags are gone nothing they could do. We argued and said we dont even know who is to pay (ie who's suitcase was overweight) so wouldnt be paying, asked to see a TC rep to which they replied its just gone up to £150!!! Which obviously took us from reasonable to p*ssed off !! explained to the rep she said nothing she could do so we asked for a reciept or to pay by cheque (so we had proof of the scam) to which they replied seeing as you are being aggressive were taking you off the flight. I mean this was unbelievable! we honestly wernt aggressive, we were annoyed i wont lie but didnt shout or anything. To cut a long story short we offered to pay the £150 to get back on the flight, they said they would check with the captian and accepted. On returning in to Birmingham we took the suitcases straight to check in and asked them to weigh them and as suspected they were all under weight, in total under weight by 9kg exactly what they had said we were over!! We got proof and have wrote several lettersnto which we have always got the same response - Nothing we can do!!!

I swore never to go back but I really like Turkey (DAMN!) so i am going back and would appreciate any advise on how to ensure we do not go through anything similar.

I dont think the travel scales will do any good they will just say they dont work and we have already booked excess luggage.

I hope none of you experience what we did and enjoy your hols!!

Ash + Alan xx

I am not being to critical when i say this but when i check in our luggage i check the weight on the scales as i do it myself .i dont leave it to anyone else,then you can argue straight away before the cases go through.

We always double check our cases on aspare scales before we join the queue. Never had any trouble and the suitcases have always weighed the same on the check in.