Virgin Australia passengers can now track their bags on the entire network

Virgin Australia was the first Aussie airline to do this – and now it has expanded the tool across it’s entire network

Virgin Australia was the first Aussie airline to provide a tracking service for luggage — and now it has expanded the tool across its entire network.

The technology previously allowed passengers flying on some domestic routes to take advantage of the bag tracking program via the airline’s smartphone app.

However, on Wednesday, the airline announced customers flying on both domestic and international routes including Queenstown, Bali, Fiji, Samoa, Vanuatu and Japan — can also use the tool.

Virgin passengers can now track their bags across the airline’s entire network.

As part of the expansion, customers can now track their baggage end-to-end via the app, receiving push notifications when their baggage has been checked in, loaded onto the aircraft, transferred to a connecting carrier and upon arrival.

The tool also advises the baggage carousel for collection once the guest is at their final destination.

Customers receive push notifications when their baggage has been checked in, loaded onto the aircraft, transferred to a connecting carrier and upon arrival.

News.com.au understands the new “loaded” feature, confirming the baggage has been loaded onto the aircraft, is not available with any other Australian airline.

“Australians find comfort in the ability to track food deliveries, postal deliveries, technology, even their heart rate, all via apps, and it made sense for travellers to be able to do the same thing when flying Virgin Australia,” Virgin Australia chief customer and digital officer, Paul Jones, said.

The tool has since been used approximately 1.3 million times by Aussie travellers, with Virgin having seen a 12 per cent increase in app downloads.

“By further enhancing our Australian-first baggage tracking technology to include all international services and additional notifications, we are giving guests the peace of mind to know where their baggage is at every step of the journey.”

Virgin was the first Aussie airline to provide a tracking service to its luggage

In the past 12 months the airline has also launched digital systems and Rapid Rebook – a tool for guests to self-manage their bookings end-to-end in the event of disruption.

“These advancements work to improve the customer experience and complement our consistently low call-wait times,” Mr Jones said.

Mishandled bags globally

In 2022, when 3.42 billion passengers flew around the world, 26 million bags were misplaced, or 7.6 per 1000 passengers, according to airline IT specialist SITA which studies the problem in its annual Baggage IT Insights.

This is almost double the amount compared to statistics from 2021, which had the rate at 4.35 bags for every 1000 travellers.

The report claimed the increase was due to a sharp rise in demand for air travel combined with staff and resource shortages.

“Our baggage tracking tool, which has been used more than 1.3 million times since its pilot in May last year, has had an overwhelmingly positive response from guests,” a Virgin Australia spokesperson told news.com.au.

“We are proud to already have a very low mishandled baggage rate when compared to the global industry average – the tool is really in place to give our guests peace of mind when flying with us.

“Expanding the tool to our entire international network gives travellers a consistent service they can now rely on every time they travel with us.”