Be afraid, be very afraid when checking your golf clubs on a flight into SFO (San Francisco International airport for the acronym impaired). On a recent trip to the San Fran area, I had four different golfers volunteer SFO club horror stories to me.

They detailed disappeared clubs, but the biggest complaint seemed to be that sometimes the system at SFO makes you wish they had lost your clubs. Because after waiting and waiting to get them, a vanished set can seem like the lesser of two pains. It turns out SFO has this system where oversized bags like golf club carriers are brought out through a special side door.

Nothing wrong with that on the surface. Newark Airport has the same deal and I’ve never had a problem there at one of the busiest airports in the world. But SFO’s baggage handlers seem to think this system calls for a slow crawl. One golfer told me how he waited an hour and half after all the other bags were off the plane and down the baggage carousel before that side door finally creaked open. Then, the handler made a comment about how he shouldn’t play golf if he didn’t want to wait.

Ah, customer service!

It’s time more people, especially golfers who pump plenty of cash into the industry with their trips, to call airports on their customer treatment. Forget the fact that SFO is one of the worst designed airports in the world with its rental car facilities about a 25-minute monorail ride from the terminals with 15 stops along the way. When you cannot bother to get the oversized bags through in a semi timely manner something’s not right.

A great city like San Francisco deserves a facility that gives visitors a better first impression.

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