Airline Damaged Your Baggage and Denied Compensation? Do These Five Things First

Reviewed on: 2026-06-12.

Your suitcase came off the belt cracked, and the airline is refusing to pay or has gone silent. Five actions decide this dispute, and one deadline can kill it.

1. Report at the airport, before you exit the baggage hall. Go to the airline's baggage counter and get a Property Irregularity Report (PIR) with your baggage tag number on it. This is your foundation document.
2. Send a written complaint to the airline within 7 days of receiving the bag. This is the trap that sinks most claims. Under the Carriage by Air Act, 1972, which applies the Montreal Convention rules, a damage complaint must reach the carrier in writing within 7 days of receipt of the baggage. Miss it and the airline can lawfully refuse the claim, however good your photos are. A PIR alone may not count as the written complaint, so email the airline anyway.
3. Photograph everything the same day. Wide shots of the bag, close-ups of each crack or torn zip, the baggage tag, and the boarding pass.
4. Get a written repair estimate from a luggage shop, or a note that the bag is beyond repair plus a replacement value. Airlines pay repair cost or depreciated value, not the price of a new bag.
5. Escalate if denied or ignored: airline nodal officer, then the AirSewa portal at airsewa.gov.in, then a consumer commission through e-Daakhil.

Air carrier liability in India is not ordinary consumer law alone. It sits under the Carriage by Air Act, 1972. For international journeys the Montreal Convention applies; for domestic journeys the Central Government has applied a similar scheme by notification. Both versions carry the same notice rule: damage to checked baggage must be complained of in writing within 7 days of the date you received the bag. For delayed baggage the window is 21 days from the date the bag was placed at your disposal.

The liability caps also come from this framework. For international carriage the Montreal Convention limit for baggage is set in Special Drawing Rights, currently in the region of 1,288 SDR per passenger, roughly Rs 1.4 lakh, revised every five years. For domestic flights the notified limit is much lower, commonly applied at Rs 20,000 per passenger for checked baggage unless you declared a higher value and paid for it. Verify the current figures before quoting them in a legal notice; the principle to remember is that the cap is per passenger, not per bag.

• PIR copy or reference number.
• Baggage tag and boarding pass.
• Dated photos of the damage.
• Written repair estimate or beyond-repair note with replacement value.
• Purchase invoice of the bag if you have it; age of the bag affects depreciated value.
• Your emailed complaint to the airline, sent within 7 days, with delivery proof.

To: Customer grievance / nodal officer, [Airline]

Subject: Written notice of baggage damage under the Carriage by Air Act, 1972 - PNR [PNR], tag [number]

I travelled on flight [number] from [origin] to [destination] on [date]. On receiving my checked-in bag at [time], I found it damaged: [describe]. PIR [reference] was raised at the airport on the same date.

This email is my written complaint within seven days of receipt of the baggage, as required under the rules applied by the Carriage by Air Act, 1972.

Attached: PIR, baggage tag, boarding pass, photographs, repair estimate of Rs [amount] from [shop].

Please confirm the compensation payable and the timeline in writing. If the claim is denied or ignored, I will escalate to AirSewa and the consumer commission.

[Name, mobile, email, date]

1. Airline nodal or appellate officer. Every scheduled airline publishes one on its website. Quote your first claim reference.
2. AirSewa. The Ministry of Civil Aviation's grievance portal routes your complaint to the airline with regulator visibility. Upload the PIR, your 7-day email, and the denial.
3. DGCA. The regulator does not award compensation in individual baggage cases, but repeated or serious service failures can be flagged.
4. Consumer commission. For an unfair denial, file on e-Daakhil for deficiency in service. Filing is free for claims up to Rs 5 lakh.

A passenger flew Delhi to Bengaluru in January 2026. Her 14-month-old hard-shell bag, bought for Rs 9,200, arrived with a cracked shell and one wheel snapped. She got a PIR at the belt, emailed the airline the next morning with photos and a Rs 3,800 repair estimate, and so met the 7-day rule with six days to spare. The airline first offered Rs 1,500 citing “wear and tear”. She replied attaching the PIR and estimate, copied the nodal officer, and filed an AirSewa grievance on day 12. The airline revised its offer to Rs 3,500, slightly below the estimate to account for the bag's age. She accepted. Total time: 26 days. The case turned on two things: the PIR, and the written complaint inside 7 days.

Not against the airline. IndiGo, SpiceJet, Akasa, and Air India (now privately owned) are not public authorities, so an RTI to them has no legal force. RTI works on the government side only: you can ask the DGCA or the Ministry of Civil Aviation for the action taken on your AirSewa grievance, or for any circular on baggage claims. See how to file RTI online and use a first appeal if the PIO does not reply.

• Leaving the airport without a PIR, then trying to claim a week later.
• Treating the PIR as the claim. Send the separate written complaint within 7 days.
• Demanding the price of a new bag. Ask for repair cost or depreciated value to stay credible.
• Quoting an old SDR or rupee cap in a legal notice without checking the current figure.
• Forgetting travel insurance. Many policies cover baggage damage but need fast notice and proof you first claimed from the airline.

Legally the airline can refuse it, and most do. You can still try goodwill channels and AirSewa, and if the damage was concealed (for example, found only on unwrapping), say so with proof. But treat 7 days as the real deadline.

Do not rely on it. The safe practice is a separate email to the airline's grievance address within 7 days, referring to the PIR. It costs five minutes and removes the airline's best defence.

Reply with close-up photos and the repair estimate, and ask the airline to state in writing which part of the damage it attributes to wear. Cracked shells and snapped wheels on a bag in normal condition are handling damage, and consumer commissions have treated such denials as deficiency in service.

A single international journey, including its connecting legs on one ticket, is generally treated under the Montreal Convention rules. Keep the full itinerary and tag receipts to show it was one carriage.

You can include them, but airlines exclude fragile and valuable items in their conditions of carriage, and proof is harder. List the items in the PIR and the 7-day email, with photos.

AirSewa first. It is faster and free, and a documented AirSewa trail strengthens a later consumer complaint if the airline still refuses a fair amount.

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Download the damaged baggage claim checklist (PDF).