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A mother said she was left feeling “humiliated” after easyJet gate staff tried to charge her extra for a small bag full of breast milk and pumping equipment.
The incident occurred when mother-of-three Daisy Crawford was travelling on a short easyJet flight from Bristol to Belfast on Sunday 27 April.
Ms Crawford was not travelling with her children at the time, but is currently breastfeeding her son, so she took a breast pump, storage bags and a cook bag with her so she could pump milk while she was away and return with it, she told The Independent.
The UK government’s travel advice states that you can carry breast milk in hand luggage even if you’re not travelling with a baby, while both easyJet and the government say that there is no legal limit on how much you can travel with, providing it fits in individual containers that are up to 2L in size.
However, when Ms Crawford arrived at the gate, she found herself being stopped and questioned as to why she had an additional bag with her, and the airline tried to charge her £48 for the extra bag.
The mother explained to staff that her extra bag contained breast milk and breastfeeding equipment. She claimed: “They said it doesn't matter, you still need to pay now.”
EasyJet later said in a statement that they “do allow customers an additional free-of-charge bag for a breast pump and milk” but ask to be told in advance.
When reading easyJet’s baggage policy, Ms Crawford spotted that you are allowed to bring one standard carrier bag of items you bought at the airport, such as duty-free shopping.
Meanwhile, Ms Crawford said her additional bag, which was a small tote, was smaller than that of some airport shopping bags.
“Breastfeeding is protected by law, and if you're charging me to carry this when it's medically essential, you're effectively financially penalising me,” she told The Independent.
“Regardless of whether you breast or formula feed your baby, there shouldn't be any barriers in place externally [to] whatever way you choose to do that.
“If you're breastfeeding and you're expressing milk, which is essential for my health, there shouldn't be any barriers to keeping that with me.”
“If you don't pump, not only can it affect your supply, but also you're more likely to get mastitis,” she added. “You get engorged, and mastitis is a precursor to things like sepsis, [which] is quite a serious infection, and you get temperatures and flu-like symptoms.”
After expressing this to the gate staff, Ms Crawford said they “weren’t engaged in my point… they just said, ‘you’ve got to pay’.
“I was quite distressed at this point, because I felt embarrassed. There's a queue of people waiting.”
“This is breast milk,” she added. “I'm not trying to get away with anything.”
Ms Crawford said she understood the staff were just doing their job, so she asked to escalate the issue to management.
However, when she got on the phone to the manager and explained her situation, they said they would speak to their colleague, and then the the line went dead.
The manager phoned back to the gate, but at that point, the coach carrying passengers to the plane was filling up.
“I said: Can I speak to them [the manager] again? They said no, that the manager wouldn't speak to me a second time, even though they hadn't actually answered my question. And the gate staff said, ‘No, you've got to pay’ and got the card machine.”
The staff warned Ms Crawford that there was no time to speak to the manager and that she was going to miss her flight.
Ms Crawford said she resorted to opening up her cabin bag and taking out layers of clothing to put them on and make space for her bag of breast milk.
The mother said she felt her “private situation was being made very public” and “felt I was being treated really unfairly”, adding that she was in tears once she climbed onto the coach.
She added that believes the on-the-ground training, regardless of policy, needs to be better.
“It's not really okay to be questioning people's medical situation or the feeding situation.”
A spokesperson for easyJet said: “We are very sorry for Ms Crawford’s experience while boarding her flight, as this is not the level of service we expect.
“We advise customers to carry baby milk in their cabin baggage and do allow customers an additional free-of-charge bag for a breast pump and milk.
“We ask them to let us know in advance of travel so there are no issues at the gate.”
Easyjet also clarified that a breast pump can fall under medical equipment and can be taken in an additional bag, but asks for passengers to let them know ahead of travel so they can add it to their booking.
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