Baggage on United and Delta Flights
 

We have booked several United and Delta flights in USA for our upcoming trip. I have not seen anywhere during the booking process that I can select to add baggage. Do I just pay for this at the airport upon check in? In Australia I believe it is much cheaper on the discount airlines to pre-purchase one's baggage rather than at the airport. Do United or Delta have a similar policy? If so, can anyone give me a link where I can do this (as I have not managed to find anything myself). Thanks.

here is a link from Delta that says something about checking bags online 24 hours ahead:
http://www.delta.com/content/www/en_...p/checked.html

I am less sure about the helpfulness of this link, but take a look:
http://www.united.com/CMS/en-US/trav...edBaggage.aspx

I Googled "(Airline name) Baggage Charges", btw. Hope it helps.

If you print your boarding Pass 24 hours ahead, you then select the number of bags you're checking.

Thanks for that. My problem with printing one's boarding pass 24 hours in advance of flying is that it is not always possible when travelling - ie. don't have access to a printer. I guess one just does it at the airport at time of flying in that case?

You don't have to print the boarding passes, you just have to check in online. So if you will gave Internet access, it will work fine. Then you just print the passes at the airport, where you drop off your bags.

IME, btw, it's not always cheaper to check your bags online in advance; sometimes, but not always. Dunno if it's the airline, or specific flights, or what determines that.

To be clearer: check in online, declare how many bags you're checking, pay for them, then print boarding passes at airport.

On both United and Delta, there's no discount for paying in advance for bags, though you can. But if you aren't printing out your boarding pass in advance, there's no reason to do so. It saves no time. You still have to swipe your credit card at the airport kiosk.

< You still have to swipe your credit card at the airport kiosk.>
Is that new? The last time I checked bags, about 18 months ago, I paid online and did not have to swipe my card.

But anyway you're right, it doesn't save time to print boarding passes if you're checking luggage because you still have use the kiosk to process the luggage.

I always check in on-line, more to confirm my seat than to save time. Planes are so oversold nowadays, I don't leave anything to chance.

You can also just pay for the bags when you check in at the airport.