Staff at seven UK airports offered bonuses for catching oversized bags, leak reveals
5 July 2025, 23:55 | Updated: 6 July 2025, 00:18
Aviation company Swissport has been offering their staff bonuses for every easyJet bag they apprehend, a leaked email has revealed.
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The email, publicised by the Jersey Evening Post, informed Swissport staff of their new “easyJet gate bag revenue incentive”.
Starting in November 2023 and still in force, the programme promises staff £1.20 per apprehended bag (£1 after tax).
Swissport operates passenger services at 17 airports across the UK, and the leaked email is understood to have been sent to seven airports in Belfast, Liverpool, Newcastle, Birmingham and Jersey.
However, Swissport is not the only company with this type of programme in place; DHL Supply Chain, who operate with easyJet across Bristol, Manchester and Gatwick, also offer bonuses for catching oversized baggage.
Read More: Ryanair: Budget airline to increase its free bag area by 20 per cent
The leaked Swissport incentive, seen by The Sunday Times, self-described as a “reward” for “doing the right thing”, signed off with pre-emptive thank you to staff for their “ongoing contribution to the success of easyJet”.
The program encouraged boarding-gate staff to charge a flat fee of £48 per bag to customers whose luggage is deemed too big for the cabin: £1.20 of which would go directly to the staff member.
Permitted to either bring a small underseat cabin bag for free, or pay for a slightly larger bag to go in the overhead locker, customers are routinely met with a metal measurement box at the gate.
The bag allowances have strictly enforced dimensions; for easyJet, an overhead bag has to be 56cm height, 45cm width and 25cm depth.
However, complaints from customers who believe their bags were within the correct dimensions but still received the flat fee, have hit the headlines since the incentive came into force.
easyJet, who raked in £9 billion in revenue last year, do not have direct oversight over the commissions as they’re handled internally by Swissport and other handling companies.
Swissport also operates for several other airlines, including Vueling, Lufthansa, Ryanair and Tui - but Lufthansa have said they don’t operate any baggage handling incentives.
The leak comes amid a push from the EU to strengthen air travellers’ rights, voting to enshrine carry-on luggage as a right instead of a paid luxury. The vote, put forward by Italian MEP Matteo Ricci, was backed by a coalition of European Parliamentarians.
In 2014, the European Court of Justice ruled that baggage was a “necessary aspect” of air travel.
