Sydney transfer - should I be worried?

[Mightymouse]

Arriving 6:35 on Virgin VS200 from Hong Kong, with luggage (and possibly oversized as I may have a fishing rod) so I will need to exit, wait for luggage, clear customs. 9:45am flight time on Air NZ to Auckland, which has no online check-in, website says must be checked in 90 minutes before. That gives me max an hour and a 45 minutes to get to the ANZ check-in counter. Heard that morning is busy in Sydney, and not sure about the arrival time reliability of Virgin - should I be worried? Australian passport, and tickets are separate unfortunately.

 

[JohnK]

Welcome to AFF Mightymouse!

Are you not able to check luggage through?

I believe 3:10 hours should be enough anyway unless your inbound aircraft is late. With my limited experience Virgin Atlantic are not too bad with their on time performance.

I have collected luggage and golf clubs from oversize and gone through quarantine in ~45 minutes so plenty of time. Worse case scenario is ~1 hour. One thing you can try and do is see if the Air NZ transfer counter is staffed and check-in for your flight that way. Not sure if SYD is efficient as SIN/HKG and they are able to transfer your luggage to Air NZ flight while you are in transit.

Do you have any express arrival cards? They may assist in getting through quarantine quicker. I have some but they are in SYD and not back home for another 3 weeks.

 

[RooFlyer]

Agree with JohnK that you should be OK.

If you have Australian passport with chip, use smartgate of course (may be available to NZ passport holders as well ???), that'll save some time, but the baggage & customs will be the rate determining step. The fishing rod may attract some customs attention. If its obvious as a fishing rod, and/or you have had to check any of the customs boxes on the incoming passenger form, you'll may get an open-bag inspection. But still should be OK for the AirNZ connection.

 

[Mightymouse]

Thanks JohnK, RooFlyer. Virgin said they won't interline luggage, as separate tickets. No express cards but will ask for. Will be travelling with a 12 year old so can't use smartgate, but hopefully will get through on time!

 

[JohnK]

No express cards but will ask for. Will be travelling with a 12 year old so can't use smartgate, but hopefully will get through on time!

When are you travelling?

I can post some express arrival cards out to you in a couple of weeks or if you need them quicker there should be someone on AFF that has some spares they can post to you.

 

[Mightymouse]

When are you travelling?

I can post some express arrival cards out to you in a couple of weeks or if you need them quicker there should be someone on AFF that has some spares they can post to you.

Thanks JohnK, very kind of you. I am in HK and travelling on June 9th.

 

[JohnK]

Thanks JohnK, very kind of you. I am in HK and travelling on June 9th.

I will try and get some express arrivals cards sent to you.