A new Lost Property Hub has been opened at East Midlands Airport to help reunite customers with the thousands of items that are misplaced every year.
The purpose-built space in the arrivals area is part of an ongoing £120m investment programme at the airport. The hub provides a contact point for customers with Lost Property staff and has everything required in one place to log, store and hopefully return items to their owners. It has been completed with a wood panel finish that’s echoed throughout the airport, including recent upgrades to the security hall and Meet and Greet office.
A new system introduced as part of the improvements now also makes it simpler for customers to provide details of their lost items through a dedicated form on the East Midlands Airport website here. Once details for an item have been registered, the system automatically checks the list of found items for any potential matches and displays these to a member of staff for verification. If there are no immediate matches, the system will continue to check any newly found items for up to 14 days, and keeps the customer informed of progress in the meantime.
Once an item has been verified as an accurate match, the details are sent to the customer to confirm, and choose if they want the items to be shipped (for a fee, payable online) or to collect the item by arranging a slot at the new Lost Property Hub. Anything found where it is not possible to identify the owner are kept for 30 days for low value items or 90 days for high value items, before being donated to charity, or sent for recycling.
Everything from phones, tablets, earphones and hair straighteners to keys, passports, wallets containing cash and credit cards, clothing and baggage can end up left or lost at the airport. If items are lost in baggage reclaim or on board an aircraft, this is dealt with by the baggage handling company and the airline. Anywhere else on the airport site including car parks, check-in hall, security hall and departure lounge ends up at the Lost Property hub, logged and locked securely away.
Around 3,500 items a year are misplaced at the airport, with only a quarter usually being reported as lost by customers. It’s hoped the new system and hub will improve the chances of reuniting customers with their belongings. It’s also been noted that since the introduction of new next-generation security scanners which enable customers to keep items in their bags, there has been a reduction in the number of items being left behind.
East Midlands Airport’s Customer Services and Planning Director Mike Grimes said: “As part of our ongoing investment programme and commitment to excellent customer service, I’m delighted with the opening of our new Lost Property Hub. Not only does it provide a new space for handling lost property and meeting customers, but it has improved the look of this part of the arrivals hall in line with other upgrades throughout the airport.
“The new system for logging lost property will also make the process easier so we hope that we’ll reunite more people with their belongings. I’m also pleased that fewer items are now being lost since we introduced scanners allowing belongings to be left inside bags.”