When we flew with Thomsons in June I had the same problem My partner and I usually only take one suitcase usually about 23Kgs ( I have to travel light!!). On reading all the information about combining luggage allowance it all contradicted itself . So to be on the safe side we took 2 suitcases 14kgs and 17kgs . ON check in i had printed all the information out about combining luggage etc and said to the guy this is really confusing. He then told me as long as we were on the same booking we could combine the luggage allowance So we could of travelled with 1 suitcase after all.

i think the combining of luggage is not allowed for eg the people in front of you (i.e strangers) check in 15kg and you 25kg you cannot combine it to make it 20kgs each .

Ed

I've always been told you can combine luggage between your party whichever airline I've been with. When we went in June the first case was overweight but they weighed mine before adding the excess baggage together for the charge, if mine had been underweight (no chance!) they would have taken that off the other other cases excess. Just one thing to note if you are sharing a large case, the maximum weight is 32 kilos due to health and safety regs, even if you are entitled to 20 kilos each.

we were told we weren't allowed to combine and each case can only weigh a MAXIMUM of 30kgs, due to health and saftey

Hi Lyn
I've been on quite a few Thomson holidays, the last one in June of this year.
There's 2 of us in the party, obviously both on the same booking sheet and both passports handed over at the same time ( me and hubby)
We both have identical sized cases ( bought at the same time)

Both cases have to be placed on the belt together during the checking in process ( mine always weighs more than the hubby's) and regardless of the weight of one case, the total combine should not exceed your allowance for your party and the individual, for us, the total weight is 40kgs (if allowance is 20 kgs each) if the luggage allowance is 15 kgs each, then the two cases together should weigh no more than 30 kgs before you incur excess charges.

If there's 4 in the party booking in together, regardless of the weight of one case, the total should not excess the individual allowances when they are all weighed, so in your case, if you're allowed 80 kgs, one case can weigh more than the other, as long as all the cases weighed on the belt together at the same time, are within your parties allowance.

Thomson's policy is now......
After all the cases in your party have been weighed on the belt together, you then have to place your hand luggage on top of your cases and the added weight of your hand luggage is tallied up with the weight the cases have registered.
They are "red hot" on this issue, which I presume is to prevent people shifting the load into their hand luggage and being under weight on the hold luggage to avoid excess charges.

At the check in desk, they will ask you how many cases you are booking in, but the total tallied up must not exceed your total for your party and the individual allowances.
Like I say, our allowance is 40 kgs, and the combined weight of the 2 cases on my last holiday was 39.5 kgs...phew! just under the allowance before having to pay 10 euros for every 1 kg excess with all those fags.!

For health and safety reasons to protect the baggage handlers, no case of whatever size, colour or shape should weigh more than 32 kgs ...so theoretically speaking, we could have 2 cases, one could weigh 30 kgs and the other 10 kgs.

Sanji
Edit..Can't spell this morning

On First Choice flights, the maximum weight for any one case is now 23kg, for handlers health and safety, and from next May, I think, when this airline merges completely with Thomson fly, Thomson's max will be 23kg too.

we have just had the same experience as Sanji describes when we flew back frome malaga last saturday. The thomson rep was great actually, we were 2kg over in the cases, but bang on 50kg including hand luggage so he just asked us to go round the corner and stuff 2kgs worth of stuff from the case into the hand luggage! Bit of a pain as i was walking round with shoes, towels and a hairdryer in my hand luggage but at least we were given that opportunity rather than having to pay the €18!

It still makes me laugh they are hot on weighing luggage and hand luggage at check in . - but what about all the stuff people buy in duty free - On our last flight with Thomson a woman sat in front of me with 4 large bags of hand luggage !!!!!! Air hostess under her breath you are only supposed to have 1 piece of hand luggage but still helped hew stow her large bags around the plane !!!!!

Thank you everyone, that is a great weight of my mind, all I have to do now is convince my grandson that he can't take the entire contents of his toy-box.

We found out this morning that we have been bumped to a 5* due to our hotel being refurbished. This has got to be the bargain of my lifetime as we paid under £2600 for 2 weeks AI in the Dominican Republic for all four of us.

Now I suppose I'd better look out some posh frocks.

Thats brilliant news for you Silverpixie.

kath x

On First Choice flights, the maximum weight for any one case is now 23kg, for handlers health and safety, and from next May, I think, when this airline merges completely with Thomson fly, Thomson's max will be 23kg too.

This pees me off big time.
32kgs is the universal max load accepted by all the airlines, and this 23kg is a RECOMMENDATION from the HSE which stems from BA and the baggage handlers at Heathrow.

In one way, I can understand their point of view because for years the old EEC rules put a limit on the weight one person can lift/carry and for years that limit has been 25kg...this is why no bags of cement, potatoes, coal or whatever are sold in bags holding more than 25kgs.

But, there is a way around this, the likes of Ikea and MFI comply with the EU rules and mark the packages as heavy and the load weight in KGS, and obviously they have more brains in their heads than the reprobates would run airlines because they employ 2 PERSONS to lift the load or have mechanical equipment.

But, hang on, that would mean employing more staff, paying out more wages and not fleecing the general public on the excess luggage charges, which is a right little earner.!

As far as I know, it is a recommendation and not a ruling, but like sheep the rest will follow BA and you'll split the load into 2 cases and end up be charged for checking in the extra case.

You just can't win

Sanjiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

When we flew out to Sanford from Manchester there were nine of us and we were given a combined weight of 180kilos between us all for the main hold luggage. One of our cases weighed in at 26 kilos and the check in desk just put a heavy bright orange label on it and it was not refused at all

We flew with Air canada in the Summer and they would not allow combining. Each person had to have individual luggae with a 23kg limit. They provided a scale in the check in area and those with cases over the limit had do do some emergency re-packing to spread the weight between their cases!

IMO: It's a complete minefield and a shambles.
My son flew with Virgin to Australia 2 weeks ago (to live) and apart from me being pretty "cut up" about this, he has had to leave half his life back here in the UK because his allowance before he incurred any excess baggage charges was 23kgs, but that doesn't mean his case couldn't have weighed for example 28 kgs.
He would have incurred charges of 5kgs excess based on 1.5% of the highest normal direct adult one way fare.
23kgs is the max free luggage allowance.

If he'd been flying "upper class" his allowance would have been 30kgs and if he'd gone over the allowance by more than 2 kgs, then he would have had to pack the contents into smaller units to comply with the 32kgs max load and pay excess weight charges for anything over 30kgs.

If you are travelling to/from the USA, Caribbean, Kenya or Nigeria your luggage is calculated on the size/dimensions and number of cases and not the weight system, but the 32kgs limit for baggage handlers still applies for the max load in ONE single suitcase.

http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/passengerinformation/baggage/excess.jsp
http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/passengerinformation/baggage/baggagebyweight.jsp
http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/passengerinformation/baggage/baggagebypiece.jsp

Sanji

We recently flew with XL and hubby's case was over
mine was ubnder and we weren't charged anything . So i would say
it all depends on the airline