UKC

I’m off to Milan and onward to Switzerland at the end of the week for some famous routes on the piz badile. 

I’ve booked a flight with Whizz air and managed to save circa £120 for the round trip by booking a piece of “sports equipment” instead of a conventional hold luggage. I’m planning on putting a rack and twin ropes with two harnesses and helmets in a duffel bag and carrying everything else in hand luggage. 

Has anyone had any difficulties with Whizz air or other airlines and this particular matter before? 

I've no experience of this but I suspect you might run into difficulties, since climbing gear isn't listed as one of the items which can be transported as sports equipment. There seems a fair chance they will check, since a duffel bag won't look as if it contains permitted items.

https://wizzair.com/en-gb/information-and-services/travel-information/bagga...

The idea of the sports equipment allowance is to carry large and/or heavy items which otherwise wouldn't meet the criteria for hold luggage - skis, bikes, golf clubs etc.  Climbing gear can be carried as normal luggage, and it seems to me there's a considerable risk you'll end up having to pay full whack for a piece of conventional hold luggage and won't get a refund for your 'sports equipment':. Read the Q&As: If you check in fewer items of baggage than you had paid for, the baggage fee will not be refunded.

Check with the airline, and if they say it's OK get that in writing. 

I'd genuinely rather not go on a trip than go on one that involved Wizz Air. The worst airline I've ever used by far.

Looks ok to me. I usually pile everything into a nondescript cheap kitbag, and choose the cheapest baggage option available. I've used WA LGW-ATH and they were fine, but I didn't have anything sporty with me. Good luck.

I've carried ski and paragliding gear as sports equipment on Easyjet and IIRC Ryanair several times and the bored staff have never looked to me like they were about to check the contents. I did once have a fun conversation about why a paraglider is not a hang glider (double the price). This seemed to cause them momentary excitement, involving a chain of supervisors. Never flown Wizzair. 

They're basically Ryanair but pink and purple, and a bit worse.

The OP might get away with it, but there's a good chance they won't, because these airlines make money by catching people out.

But presumably both of those bits of kit look visually distinct from a standard item of luggage, so it's obvious that you're not just trying to dodge a higher baggage charge for your holdall. Which, by contrast, is exactly what New Max is trying to do.

Ryanair also have sports kit fees that aren't wildly different from the hold baggage fees anyway, so there's less reason for people to use them as a cheat, and consequently less reason for them to check. Which seems like a more sensible pricing scheme, to be honest. Why would you charge customers less to deal with more awkward luggage?

If I recall correctly there was an airline I flew with some years ago that had a similar crazy pricing structure where "sporting equipment" was significantly cheaper than a second hold bag.

People quickly started exploiting this using golf bags. Very easy to pick up second hand, super cheap, really large and facilitated another 32kg of luggage at a fraction of the cost of a second bag.

I flew with bouldering mats which they accepted as sport equipment without quibble.

A year later there was a price premium on anything you were foolish enough to call sport equipment.

As far as the paraglider goes, no. I don't want to load my paragliding rucksack directly into the hold, as if the baggage-handlers damage it, I have a problem. I prefer to pack everything into a 150L duffel bag, which is pretty much bullet proof. The contents could be anything, though it is lighter than if it contained clothing.