Checked bags questions

[user 6862]

Trip is :

Chicago to Seattle 5 - 7 Feb 22
Seattle to Los Angeles 9 - 10 Feb 22

12 Days in LAX

Los Angeles to Washington DC 23 - 27 Feb 22

We'll have winter clothes and warmer climate clothes, so can travel with two main bags needing only one during any journey

Is it possible to check 1 bag from CHI through to LAX even though we are in Seattle for 1 1/2 days and will they hold it if it arrives 2 days before we arrive?

Or is it possible to check one or both bags from CHI to SEA and re-check one bag through to LAX immediately on arriving in King Street Station, before we head to our hotel, even though it is 2 calendar days before we leave?

I assume there is no problem booking bags from LAX through to WAS even though it is Train-Thruway Bus-Train?

Thank you, still so many questions

 

[zephyr17]

Yes, I've checked a bag from New York to Seattle while I went via LA. It was in Seattle's baggage room when I arrived.

 

[TinCan782]

It just says $10 per 24 hours; nothing about more than one day.
Temporary Bag Storage
Customers holding tickets for Amtrak travel may store their items in Parcel Check service when available for $10 per item for 24 hours. Check the station detail page for the stations you'll be visiting to see if they offer this service. Customers that don't have an Amtrak ticket may store items for $20 per item for 24 hours (valid photo ID required).
https://www.amtrak.com/onboard/baggage-policy/at-station-baggage-services.html

 

[zephyr17]

It just says $10 per 24 hours; nothing about more than one day.
Temporary Bag Storage
Customers holding tickets for Amtrak travel may store their items in Parcel Check service when available for $10 per item for 24 hours. Check the station detail page for the stations you'll be visiting to see if they offer this service. Customers that don't have an Amtrak ticket may store items for $20 per item for 24 hours (valid photo ID required).
https://www.amtrak.com/onboard/baggage-policy/at-station-baggage-services.html

That is parcel check for carry ons. That is different from picking up checked bags. There is no charge for checked bags, and they will hold them for free for a reasonable length of time.

 

[user 6862]

Thank you both and I have now read the checked bag link, it isn't specific as to time or train connections.

As it isn't set into the Checked Bag text it's possible for an Amtrak employee in CHI to think one thing, and another employee in Seattle to think another.

It is obvious that we should be able to 'store' a bag at least 24 hours but that would not be long enough for our circumstances. Maybe I shouldn't be so lazy and just take both our bags to our hotel to be sure.

For the 3rd journey above the ticket is classed as a Multi-City Trip with connecting links, times and dates connect into each other. The first 2 journeys are also on 1 ticket which is also classed as a Multi-City Trip even though the dates are not consecutive and were meant to be purchased separately.

Perhaps play safe is best, take it all with us.

 

[BCL]

I can't find anything says how long baggage can stay in the baggage area. Obviously there are cases where the bag can arrive before the passenger if it goes on a different route than the passenger. I looked up the baggage tags (it's been about 6 years since the last time I checked in a bag) and there's nothing really that indicates when a bag should arrive, so I'm not sure how long they hold it for other than just keeping tabs on bags that come in by separating them by incoming date.

I would point out that LAUS is one of the few stations with a baggage carousel. Do they allow anyone into the baggage room or does it require a claim check to enter?

 

[zephyr17]

Well, pretty much what happens is it goes by the most direct route. Multi-city doesn't really make a difference, as long as your destination city is on your reservations, Amtrak will accept it. I know the baggage agent at New York didn't have any issue when he saw my ticket via LA. He saw Seattle and he tagged the bag with an SEA tag. The bag went directly, though. It didn't follow me.

They just put it on shelf. After they quit loading the carousel at Seattle, they took my claim check, went and found it, and handed it to me. No worries.

 

[Cal]

I assume there is no problem booking bags from LAX through to WAS even though it is Train-Thruway Bus-Train?

Curious, what's your LAX-WAS routing?

 

[BCL]

Well, pretty much what happens is it goes by the most direct route. Multi-city doesn't really make a difference, as long as your destination city is on your reservations, Amtrak will accept it. I know the baggage agent at New York didn't have any issue when he saw my ticket via LA. He saw Seattle and he tagged the bag with an SEA tag. The bag went directly, though. It didn't follow me.

They just put it on shelf. After they quit loading the carousel at Seattle, they took my claim check, went and found it, and handed it to me. No worries.

As far as I can tell, baggage is still decidedly old school with Amtrak. No bar codes, no tracking, but just a cardboard tag with just the destination and barely any place to write down anything else. As long as a station agent is willing to write down a destination, it can go pretty much anywhere in the Amtrak system with checked baggage.

 

[user 6862]

Curious, what's your LAX-WAS routing?

LAX -> BNL -> IND -> WAS

There is an easier routing through Chicago but we do it this way because it's...

Since realising there was actually a place called Normal and that the people living there were obviously 'normal people' I've wanted to meet a 'Normal person'.
Quite a lot of our travel is based on an off the wall idea, a whim, a news item or an unusual place name. We took the Trans Siberian because as a child Rosie played a board game "Go" which had Vladivostok on it as a destination, and I always thought Vladivostok sounded exotic.

Slightly more prosaic is we miss riding Greyhound and are not yet ready to return to them, but we have found the Amtrak Thruway buses are mostly more spacious with far fewer passenders. BNL to IND gives us 4 hours of bus riding while being able to spend time in Normal in the same trip.

Indianapolis has a certain notoriety among a few on this forum, curiosity takes us there.

WAS could have been CHI or NYC to fly back to Europe from, there are reasons for picking WAS this time but don't want to bore you with the full working of British minds.

 

[Chatter163]

Until this summer it had been six years since I had checked a bag through to a final destination, while lingering at stops I made along the way. Then this summer, while in New York I was notified that there would be no checked baggage for my return trip to Atlanta, due to an elevator problem there. (That's a whole other story.) I was going to Utica, Chicago, and DC, before heading back to ATL, so my new plan was to check the bag to DC, and carry it from there on to the Crescent.

The baggage people at NYP very adamantly told me that this was not possible, that security requirements required that the bag "stay with the passenger" all the way through any itinerary. I had to appeal to a supervisor, who was extremely sour and more concerned with covering her own butt than offering service to a Guest Rewards Select passenger caught up in an Amtrak equipment issue. I worked my charm until she relented (no easy task), and agreed "on a one-time basis only" to check my bag through. No one could tell me when or why the policy had changed from when I had previously checked a bag through, and I didn't have time to argue. The red cap in DC seemed surprised when I told her the story, as it took less than a minute to claim the bag there several days later. No storage fee was collected.

So, I wonder if there has been a change, how informed Amtrak employees are about it, and how consistently it is followed. I meant to follow-up with an email to Amtrak about it, but haven't done so.

 

[Bob Dylan]

Until this summer it had been six years since I had checked a bag through to a final destination, while lingering at stops I made along the way. Then this summer, while in New York I was notified that there would be no checked baggage for my return trip to Atlanta, due to an elevator problem there. (That's a whole other story.) I was going to Utica, Chicago, and DC, before heading back to ATL, so my new plan was to check the bag to DC, and carry it from there on to the Crescent.

The baggage people at NYP very adamantly told me that this was not possible, that security requirements required that the bag "stay with the passenger" all the way through any itinerary. I had to appeal to a supervisor, who was extremely sour and more concerned with covering her own butt than offering service to a Guest Rewards Select passenger caught up in an Amtrak equipment issue. I worked my charm until she relented (no easy task), and agreed "on a one-time basis only" to check my bag through. No one could tell me when or why the policy had changed from when I had previously checked a bag through, and I didn't have time to argue. The red cap in DC seemed surprised when I told her the story, as it took less than a minute to claim the bag there several days later. No storage fee was collected.

So, I wonder if there has been a change, how informed Amtrak employees are about it, and how consistently it is followed. I meant to follow-up with an email to Amtrak about it, but haven't done so.

Sounds like more " Make it up as you go" Policy by Amtrak Staff that need to find different jobs.