Coming back from an international trip with SFO as my first US entry. Bags were checked all the way through to my final domestic destination. As usual, I collected them at customs and went to recheck.
United refused to accept the bags because my onward flight was more than 4 hours later.
Now I’m stuck landside at SFO with multiple large bags. Can’t go back through TSA, can’t get to a lounge, can’t really do anything except wait around and then drag everything to domestic check in later to recheck again.
I fully understand not letting people show up 6 hours early and check bags. But this feels totally different. The bags were already checked through. The only reason I touched them was because US customs requires it. It’s no different than having a long domestic layover with bags checked through.
Called the 1K desk and got the usual “policy is policy” with zero acknowledgment of how dumb this is.
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