When another passenger took his carry-on bag off a plane, Royce Reece was frustrated. When he was quoted $567 to have it returned to him from the Vancouver airport’s lost and found, he was outraged. Reece and his friends had taken what he described as a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Thailand and bought the basic, black bag when they ran out of room in their luggage for the souvenirs they’d bought. On July 27, when their Air Canada flight from Bangkok landed in Vancouver and he went to retrieve it from the overhead bin it was gone. “It was definitely frustrating, and we felt pretty helpless because there was nothing we could do in that moment,” Reece said. “We had a lot of memories from the trip that were in the bag.” Fortunately, the bag was turned into YVR’s lost and found, Reece’s friend received an email, telling him to click on a link to see a photo of the bag and to choose one of three options: ship it back, schedule pick-up or donate item. Hitting a ‘brick wall’ The group had only been in Vancouver to catch a connecting flight, so picking the bag up was not an option. Clicking ship it back generated the $567.16 quote that prompted Reece and his friends to start trying to work with the lost and found department and the airline to find another way to get the bag returned. Surely, they thought, there should be a way for the airport lost and found to co-ordinate with Air Canada to put the bag on a flight to Ohio, where they live. But a representative for the lost and found told them that was not possible unless they arranged it with the airline themselves. Air Canada, according to Reece, said it was unable to assist and redirected the unsatisfied customers back to the airport lost and found. “We are sorry to learn that Air Canada cannot transport the luggage back to you. Unfortunately, YVR lost and found are unable to transport items through any airline baggage system. The available option for returning the luggage remains shipment through a third-party transportation service with a fee,” a representative from the lost and found wrote in an email provided to CTV News. Reece was confounded that what he thought was an obvious solution was unavailable. “It felt like they didn’t really care about us at all,” he said, also describing the process of trying to get the bag returned without paying hundreds of dollars as “hitting a brick wall.” Who’s responsible for carry-on bags? Gabor Lukacs, president of the Air Passengers Rights Association, explained that airlines are presumed to be liable for checked baggage that is lost or damaged. When it comes to carry-on luggage and personal items, a passenger has to prove that loss or damage “resulted from the fault of its servants or agents.” So, the airline was—legally—off the hook for facilitating the return, he said. But on Aug. 12, the day CTV News asked YVR to comment on Reece’s case, he was contacted by a representative of the airport. “I can confirm that I have spoken to (Air Canada) here at YVR and the manager agreed to receive your bag and handle it from here,” a text message to Reece read. The day after that, a spokesperson replied to CTV News and confirmed the arrangement. “Because this was actually a lost bag onboard on an aircraft, YVR returned custody of the bag back to the airline. As such, the airline has ultimately handled the shipping back to the passenger as opposed to YVR,” an emailed statement read. So what changed? “Although our lost and found team originally was not successful in co-ordinating with the airline, they continued working with both the guest and the airline and successfully had the matter escalated,” an airport spokesperson said, when asked. “The team worked directly with Air Canada’s operations manager to review the circumstances and explore available options. Following those discussions, Air Canada confirmed it could accept the bag for transport to Columbus, where United would arrange delivery to the guest. Once that was confirmed, the bag was transferred from YVR lost and found to Air Canada.” ‘Ethically correct’ solution On Aug. 15, the bag was returned to Delaware, Ohio, with even the most fragile souvenirs intact—and at no cost. “This clearly was something that was in the realm of possibility,” Reece said. “They just didn’t go the extra mile to do it.” In Lukacs’ opinion, the solution was “ethically correct” even if not something a customer is entitled to under the letter of the law. “It’s a very important distinction to be made between what airline is required and what airline may do,” he said, also asking: “Do we really have to travel with a lawyer on the one side and a reporter on the other side to just get decent service?” ‘It’s ridiculous’ For Lukacs, however, the real issue that “deserves scrutiny” is the same one that caused Reece and his friends to reach out to CTV News in the first place: the $567 shipping quote. He readily acknowledges there is no obligation for anyone to offer a customer a no-cost solution in a case like this one, or for the airport to ship the bag at its own expense. “But that’s not a license to basically collect a ransom from the person, to say ‘I’m not going to return you your bag unless you’re paying this exorbitant amount, which is substantially higher than the amount payable under normal circumstances for the same type of service,’” Lukacs said. “There’s no justification for it.” Reece and his friends only learned that arranging their own shipping was an option when a supervisor responded to an email raising concern about the price. It wasn’t explicitly mentioned in the email outlining the options for how to handle the found luggage, nor is it explicitly mentioned on the website for the airport’s lost and found. While the travellers weren’t thrilled with having to pay to fix what Reece described as “someone else’s mistake,” they were willing to spend some money to get the bag. However, the $567 quote was so high they did entertain the possibility of just cutting their losses. Reece started looking for other options and landed on a website called Luggage Forward, which bills itself as “the best way to ship luggage.” It quotes a rate of $178 for a small bag, classified as weighing up to 25 pounds and $324 for a standard bag, weighing up to 50 pounds. CTV News obtained an online shipping estimate from FedEx for an item with the dimensions of Reece’s carry-on with a weight of 30 pounds. The International Economy option, which corresponds to the one used by YVR, is estimated at $424.70. However, a significantly cheaper option of $151.09 is also available. “It really raises the question of what is so specialized that YVR is doing that justifies the cost,” Reece said. “It’s ridiculous.” CTV News asked YVR about the apparent discrepancy between its quotes and the other available options and was told people are given the option to “use YVR’s reunification service which uses a third-party service to providers to take care of the logistics with that convenience coming at a slightly higher cost.” Lukacs, however, objected to that characterization—describing the amount Reece was being asked to pay as “unconscionable” and “gouging.” In his opinion, what Reece did constitutes a public service. Thousands of lost and found items So far this year, the airport’s lost and found has received 550 pieces of luggage, a spokesperson for YVR said, in a statement. “This does not include backpacks, handbags, totes, purses or other bags that may also be used as carry-on or checked baggage. Overall, incidents involving unclaimed luggage are relatively uncommon when considered alongside the large volume of items processed through YVR’s lost-and-found program each year,” the email said. In 2026, the lost and found has handled 24,000 items in total and has a “reunification rate” of 74 per cent—which works out to more than 17,700 items returned. Items that are unclaimed or are not returned to their owners are donated to charity. Last year, for example, more than 1,500 electronic devices were donated.
