In August 2026, I was making my way home from Latin America to the Middle East — on a bargain ticket cheap enough to require four flights: first to Trinidad and Tobago, second to Amsterdam, third to Rome, and finally on to the Middle East. Nothing says “value fare” quite like collecting your suitcase from a carousel in the Caribbean, wading through passport control, and checking it in again — because apparently, checking a bag “all the way” is a courtesy KLM had decided I hadn’t earned. The Caribbean Airlines leg to Port of Spain, at least, was refreshingly uneventful.
Trinidad, Paperwork, and the Air Conditioning That Wasn’t
Trinidad and Tobago has a delightful habit of requiring electronic arrival and departure forms on both ends of your visit, on top of the usual passport control and security theatre — a small bureaucratic tax on your time that adds up fast if, like me, you have a long layover. Long connections mean immediate check-in isn’t possible, so you get to enjoy the airport’s distinctly modest air-conditioning at your leisure.
One genuinely striking moment: despite the airport sitting rather firmly within the US sphere of influence, there is a plaque expressing “profound solidarity with the families of those who lost their lives” in the bombing of Cubana de Aviación Flight 455 on 6 October 1976 — a terrorist attack that killed all 73 people on board, including the entire Cuban fencing team, many of them teenagers, fresh off winning every gold medal at the Central American and Caribbean Championships. The attack was carried out by CIA-linked operatives, and in 2005 the CIA released documents confirming it had “concrete advance intelligence, as early as June 1976,” of plans by Cuban exile terrorist groups to bomb a Cubana airliner. A sobering piece of history to stumble across between form-filling and lukewarm airport air.
AI, KLM, and the Fine Art of Confidently Being Wrong
Before the flight I tried to search if there is KLM lounge in Port-of-Spain airport. AI and KLM support both said “No”. While it’s understandable that AI makes mistakes, KLM specifically advised that even flying in business class out of Port-of-Spain no lounge is available. That is misinformation. The airport has “VIP Flyers Lounge) (WIFI is “Vip Flyers Club” and password “WelcomeVIP”). There is rather small but surprisingly comfortable SkyTeam lounge in “Piarco International Airport” available for the FlyingBlue status members.
On the baggage front, KLM informed me they had no interline agreement to check my bag through, so I’d need to collect it in Rome, then clear customs and security before checking in again for the final leg. Fortunately I had both the time and the visa to manage it — not everyone would.
Economy Comfort, Wine, and a Diplomatic Incident That Wasn’t Mine
Settled into my delightfully compact “Economy Comfort” seat for the Amsterdam leg, I attempted to sleep. If there’s one travel essential worth owning, it’s a proper blindfold paired with noise-cancelling, over-ear headphones — Sony, in my experience, edges out Bose.
In the grand tradition of airline hospitality, KLM managed to transform a perfectly ordinary economy-class lunch into a masterclass in selective compassion and linguistic favouritism. No sooner had the chap in front me polished off his tray than he decided the seat-reclining season was officially open, despite the clear rule that seats remain upright until the service is properly concluded.
While I was attempting only to secure the full bottle of wine (generously provided by the airline itself) and fold away the table before catastrophe struck, was rewarded with a sudden, forceful slam that sent red wine cascading over person, trousers and bulkhead alike. An Asian-looking attendant materialised with the speed of a man who had spotted a fellow Dutch-speaker in distress, conversed exclusively in the mother tongue with the offender, and promptly supplied towels for the wall—while the soaking passenger received nothing more than a delayed and distinctly uninterested enquiry, followed by complete indifference to the empty bottle now lurking under the seat as a future trip-hazard.
A second KLM attendant then arrived, listened to the perfectly reasonable explanation about unfinished service and upright-seat regulations, and responded by publicly threatening me with the horrors of short-haul flights before refusing to identify himself and vanishing. Coffee, when it eventually appeared, proved inaccessible thanks to the fully reclined seat grinding into my knees.
Thus began seven exquisite hours of pure economy-class enchantment: soaked to the skin in sticky red wine, knees compressed to the point of swelling, and utterly ignored while the original perpetrator received a full fifteen minutes of pre-landing pacification, complete with small gifts and soothing attention from the very attendant who had earlier issued threats. One might almost admire the efficiency with which KLM distinguishes between those who speak Dutch and those who merely pay for a seat: the former receive towels, gifts and linguistic solidarity; the latter are left to drip, suffer and limp off the aircraft with the distinct impression that non-Dutch speakers rank somewhere below the wine stains on the priority list.
KLM has introduced new complaint system, for which you receive no notification or updates. Upon checking online, it says your requested is “Completed”. How convenient.
Rome, and the Great Baggage Hunt
Landing in Rome, I waited at the carousel for my bag. After an hour, it hadn’t materialised — and judging by the crowd, I wasn’t remotely alone. I’ve never seen quite so many people wandering an airport looking for missing luggage as I did in Rome that day.
Rome gives you two options for reporting a missing bag: a machine, or a human in a queue moving at roughly one person per twenty minutes (so, about two extra hours of my life, gone). Out of sheer boredom, I self-reported via the machine while waiting. When I finally reached a person, I showed her my baggage tag, and she assured me my bag was en route to the Middle East and that I had nothing to worry about.
Confidence: high. Accuracy: to be determined.
At check-in for my onward flight, I showed the tag again and received the same reassurance. On arrival in the Middle East, after another hour of watching an empty carousel, I made my way to Lost and Found — where staff immediately told me they’d received an email from KLM confirming my bag wouldn’t arrive on time. Nobody had thought to tell me. This time, at least, the report was already filed and waiting.
What You’re Actually Entitled to When Your Bag Goes Missing
If your checked baggage is delayed on a flight covered by EU rules, the main protection comes from the Montreal Convention, rather than the fixed €250/€400/€600 compensation under EU261. The European Commission explicitly distinguishes baggage claims from flight-delay compensation.
The SDR limit is the maximum liability an airline has under the Montreal Convention for baggage claims. As of 28 December 2024, the limit is 1,519 SDR per passenger for baggage that is lost, damaged, or delayed. SDR = Special Drawing Rights, an international reserve asset created by the IMF. Its value fluctuates against currencies. 1,519 SDR ≈ €1,800–€1,900 depending on the current exchange rate.
Reimbursement of reasonable expenses
You can claim the actual, reasonable and necessary expenses caused by the baggage delay — for example:
- essential clothing and underwear
- toiletries
- medication or other necessities
- reasonable laundry costs
- other essential items you genuinely need while waiting for your luggage
Keep every receipt. The key principle is that the expenses must be reasonable and linked to the delay. You don’t have to accept an arbitrary airline allowance. An airline may have an internal policy saying, for example, that it reimburses €50/day or only certain categories of purchases. That doesn’t necessarily determine your legal entitlement. The underlying Montreal Convention claim concerns damage caused by the delay, subject to the Convention’s conditions and liability limit.
One important distinction: EU261’s €250–€600 compensation for flight delays is generally not payable merely because your baggage was delayed. That compensation relates to qualifying flight disruption, whereas delayed baggage is handled primarily under the Montreal Convention.
Reality, KLM Style
None of this was explained to me at any point in Rome or the Middle East. Naturally, I contacted KLM directly — and learned there’s no dedicated process, support line, or allowance for Flying Blue members whose luggage has gone astray.
My first compensation request was rejected almost instantly, with KLM explaining: “Under the Montreal Convention and the General Conditions of Carriage, the airline that operated your first flight or your last flight takes care of the compensation process. Please contact the first or last operating airline — in this instance, Caribbean Airlines and [the final carrier] — with your request. Always provide the reference number you received at the airport.”
This was, to put it politely, both incompetent and a fairly transparent attempt to pass the parcel. Caribbean Airlines had nothing to do with the mishap — my bag arrived with them perfectly intact, and I personally re-checked it with KLM at Port of Spain. It is precisely because KLM lacked a through-checking agreement with Caribbean Airlines that KLM, not the final leg of the journey, is the party responsible.
When I pointed this out, KLM responded with the one thing it does consistently well: silence. Raise a request via their website, and you’ll get a reply along with an instantly closed ticket — no option to reopen it, no thread to continue. Want to follow up? You get to copy your original message, paste it into a brand-new request, and start the cycle again.
I’ve now been submitting a fresh request every other day. Three weeks in, I’m still waiting on my money — a modest claim of around €500, receipts included and itemised, as requested.
The most frustrating part of all this (aside from the in-flight linguistic favouritism) is how heavily KLM now leans on AI for customer support, producing responses that are long-winded, often wrong, and functionally indistinguishable from talking to the chatbot in the first place. At this rate, KLM’s support staff may end up automating their own redundancy notices.
One can only hope the wine stains eventually come out. The impression left by KLM, one suspects, will not.
