What's smarter: Shipping or checking bags?

Photo: Hernan Pinera / Flickr

About this time of year, frequent and infrequent travelers alike are faced with the hassle, uncertainty and expense of checking bags for trips home for the holidays.

Most frequent travelers reading this rarely check bags when on the road for business– and if they do, fees are likely waived due to elite status or credit card.

But for holiday trips home, bag contents frequently expand to include winter coats, formal wear, gifts and plenty of other extraneous items– especially if kids are involved.

Shipping bags via FEDEX or UPS sounds like a great idea until you look at rates. Shipping luggage is not cheap– or fast. To get rates that come close airline fees, you must ship via ground which can take three or five days to get across the country. And distance makes a big difference when it comes to rates. Plus there’s the time cost of schlepping bags to a FEDEX or UPS facility.

To test this, I checked with FEDEX to determine how much it would cost to ship a standard carry on-sized piece of luggage (10″x 14″x 22″) weighing 25 lbs. from a FEDEX store in Atlanta to New York City, Boulder, Colo. and San Francisco.

Then I compared it to airline baggage fees.

Regional- Atlanta to New York City:

$179 each way – Standard overnight delivery

$88 each way – Two-day delivery

$27 each way — end of second day home delivery

$25 airline checked bag fee

Long distance- Atlanta to Boulder, Colo.:

$188 each way – Standard overnight delivery

$132 each way – Two-day delivery

$32 each way – Three-day (ground) home delivery

$25 airline checked bag fee

Transcon- Atlanta to San Francisco:

$203 each way – Standard overnight delivery

$149 each way – Two-day delivery

$43 each way- End of fourth day (ground) delivery

$25 airline checked bag fee

Since airlines charge $25 for the first checked bag (except Southwest and JetBlue) and $35 for the second would you pay to ship your bag, or just check it with the airline and hope for the best?

NOTE: Be sure to click here to see all recent TravelSkills posts about: World’s largest passenger plane + Get on earlier flight without paying fee + New overseas plan from Verizon + Avoid surge pricing

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