Hick

I have read with some concern about difficulties with luggage when transiting through Nairobi Airport. There are 4 of us travelling through Nairobi to Kilimanjaro. We will be landing in Nairobi on a Air Mauritius flight before transferring to a Precision Air flight 3 hours later for our onward journey to Kilimanjaro.
Should we trust the airport staff to transfer our luggage from one airline to the next or request to collect our luggage and check it in ourselves? We do not want to be difficult but it would ruin our trip if our luggage doesn't arrive with us in Kilimanjaro.
Would appreciate any advice about the transit procedure.

Pumbavu

I don't know about the transfer... but I've landed and taken off from JKIA about 30 times and the baggage handling has been very good. Quick... and with more care than certain airports I've been to.

I don't know what to suggest for the transfer but you would have time to collect and re check your luggage.... but you would have to clear customs... and I don't think there is any need to do that! Are you leaving from the same terminal?

Hick

Thanks Pumbavu - Yes we are leaving from the same terminal but we don't have visas in Kenya so I don't think we will be able to go through customs anyway. I envisage we will be in some transit area awaiting our onward flight.

kumasawa

Hick, if you want to pick up your luggage in Nairobi and then re-check the bags for your flight to Kili, then you will have to go through customs and pay $20/person for a transit visa. The baggage claim area is (downstairs) beyond customs. You then have to exit the building and walk across the street to another building to check in for your next flight. (Yes, both of those buildings connect to the same terminal.)

My wife and I did just that back in July. We arrived in Nairobi on Emirates Air from Dubai and then left a few hours later on Kenya Airways to Kigali. The only reason we did that was because we had to pick up the paper tickets for that flight at the airport, and the ticketing office is outside customs.

It would certainly be less hassle if you checked your luggage all the way through, but I can understand your concern. We didn't have any trouble with missing luggage, but we ran into several travelers with horror stories. Keep in mind, even if you go through with your plan, there is still the chance that your luggage may be lost. In Stone Town, we met a couple women who took a simple trip from NBO to ZNZ and Kenya Airways completely lost their luggage.

On some Kenya Airways flights, they don't let you board the plane until you pick out your luggage from a pile on the tarmac. I don't remember Precision Airways following that procedure on our flight from JRO to ZNZ.

Darren

Patty

Will Air Mauritius interline bags onto Precision Air? If so, your bags <i>should</i> arrive in Kilimanjaro. I've never transitted NBO between international flights, but I know with through checked bags you can stay in the airside departures area.

If you <b>want</b> to claim your bags and recheck them yourself, there's certainly enough time to do so given a 3 hour layover. To claim your bags yourself, you'll need to go through passport control. Worst case scenario they make you pay $20 for a transit visa or perhaps they'll be nice and let you pick up your bags and recheck without a visa. This is Africa, who knows? Or maybe you can find a nice airport staff member like Yvonne did to retrieve your bags for you.

Hopefully, someone else who has through checked via NBO can relate their experience as to the reliability of baggage transfers.

Leely

We through checked via NBO to JRO (whoah, that sounds weird), and yep, our luggage made it. We were flying KLM and then onto Precision. No problems, and it was a tight connection. We also didn't have Yvonne's bad experience at the transit desk at NBO. There was a short line. It was a little chaotic, but nothing out of the ordinary.

I had scheduled in a &quot;down&quot; day in Arusha before heading off just in case our luggage was a little behind us, but as it turned out we didn't need it.

This is all anecdotal, obviously. Best of luck whatever you decide. When do you head out?

kumasawa

Patty brings up the good point that it may not even be possible to have your bags transferred automatically between those two flights. Are Air Mauritius and Precision Air codeshare partners like Kenya Airways and Precision Air? Hick, are both flights on the same ticket/reservation?

Hick

Thanks for all the advice - I appreciate it.
I will contact Air Mauritius to determine if our luggage will transfer from one international flight to the next. We booked both flights through our travel agent so I am assuming the intention was to have our luggage automatically transferred. We were not advised to obtain a transit visa to check our luggage from one carrier to another - but I suppose this is not suprising. There are many airports in the world and all have different procedures. We leave on Sept 19
Thanks again

kimburu

Correct me if I'm wrong but I think most of the luggage problems have been with bags arriving there in the first place, rather than getting lost in transit at the airport itself. If you've booked your bag through to only Nairobi and it doesn't show up there you will have a dilemma - you're thinking should you report your bag missing there because your airline may not be represented at Kilimanjaro, but if you do you may miss your connecting flight? STRESS...... so I'd just check it through if it is possible and make sure you split the load between the four bags - everyone has some of everyone else's undies for example - take a survival kit in your hand lugagge and say your prayers; it'll be less hassle. ;-)

kimburu

Oh and I can tell you how to survive on a single pair of underpants for three days in the Masaai Mara if you are interested!

You don't want to know?

NoFlyZone

Just make a simple phone call to Air Mauritius (1-800-537-1182 in the US) and ask if they will check the bags through.