Who calibrates the scales?
 

Now heres an interesting thought! Last week I had to fly to an African country and take with me 2 boxes of fragile equipment. I weighed them both at home on 2 scales, both digital. Interestingly I had my weight checked at the Docs last week and both of the home scales were within half a kilo of that weight.

Box 1 weighed in at 7.1 Kilos, Box 2 - 7.2 kilos. Total 14.3 Kilos.

At the airport I put both boxes on the checkin scale and lo and behold a total of 21 kilos !!! A difference of 33%.

Now I was lucky as I wasnt that far over the 20k limit and didnt get charged an excess.

Who calibrates the checkin scales, and how often? Could this be a sneaky way of generating a little more income of unsuspecting pax?

At BRS they are checked every 6 months or so. The airport does checks as well on the occasion. A couple of months ago 1 of the scales were out by about 1 1/2 kilos out and the airport would not let anyone use it as if trading standerds found anyone usingit before it got fixed then there would be fines. All the scales have asticker on them saying their last check date andwhen they need to be checked again. Its an outside person who does all that-nothingto do with the airlines or airport.

routem You do not mention which country the scales were in. You say that you were departing for an African country but was this at your primary departure field, or a transit point?

The scales were at LHR T4

What often happens is that when people weigh things at home on their bathroom scales, they often don't get the whole item on the scales and end up taking some of the weight themselves as they try to balance the item. Also the unless the bathroom scales are on a firm hard surface, this can lead to small errors too.

I know some Airport scales are slightly out, and often if you look at the display before putting anything on them, you can see how much out they are, however I would say that in general they are more accurate than one's bathroom scales.

:\

You should have stood on the T4 scales yourself as a crosscheck!

In the UK the vast majority of scales in check-in areas are owned and maintained by the airport company.

The operator of the scales - the airline or handling agent - has a responsibility to ensure that the owner keeps the scales in working order and accurate. They can do this by audit or by seeing the check certificates from the airport. Surprisingly, it is only because of the monetary transactions (excess baggage charges) that result from using the scales that require their checking and not the safety of the aircraft.

If you want to challenge the weights ask the handling company AND BAA for a copy of the validation of weight certificate.

And if you have any issues with the scales, you can make a complaint to the local trading standards people (in the UK at least) as the same weights and measures legislation applies to airport scales as it does your local greengrocer or supermarket... :)