Airline passengers travelling with bmibaby were wrongly forced to pay £60 fines for their hand luggage because the apparatus used to measure the bags was too small, it has been claimed.

Cages used to judge whether cases were small enough to carry on board bmibaby flights were smaller than the acceptable dimensions specified by the airline.

The measuring devices at the departure gate were also reportedly smaller than those at the check-in desk, meaning passengers were led to believe their bags were the correct size before being hit with a fine as they boarded their flight.

It is believed that the cages at departure gates were made with rounded corners, meaning hard-sided bags had to be smaller than the specified limits to fit inside.

Thousands of passengers are thought to have been incorrectly fined over the past three years, reports the Daily Mail.

Bmibaby admitted the fault and said it would replace all 60 offending cages at the 30 airports it flies from.

The fault was discovered when businessman Kiran Somaiya was made to pay £30 on each leg of a return flight from East Midlands Airport to Amsterdam earlier this year because his bag would not fit in the cage at the departure gate.

Angry at being charged to put the bag in the hold, he tested the bag in a cage at the airline’s check-in desk in Amsterdam and found that it fitted perfectly.

Staff at the airline are alleged to have been aware of the issue before it was raised by Mr Somaiya.

A company source told the BBC’s ‘Watchdog’ programme: “I think all staff were aware that they were too small.

“We spoke to our line managers and they were aware and passed it on higher.”

Source : Telegraph

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