OnlyInDubai – Check-in at Shopping Mall with Bags and Head to the Airport

Imagine you are on a holiday in Dubai. And like most tourists, you visit the Dubai Mall. Perhaps on the day of your departure.

Despite your strongest urge not to shop, you cave in. But hey, you only have 4 hours before your flight takes off. What do you do?

Check-in for your flights at the Dubai Mall

dnata – the sister company of Emirates – has the perfect solution for such people. Or maybe, there are other use cases that I cannot think of.

Now, dnata has a check-in counter at the Dubai Mall (Floor: Lower Ground). The counter provides the same service as ones at the airport – select seats, print boarding pass, check-in your luggage. This counter is open every day of the week from 10am to 10pm.

You could use this service if you are flying flyDubai, Saudia, flynas, China Southern, Kuwait Airways, Gulf Air, SaudiGulf, Royal Jordanian, and Ethiopian Airlines. Note that Emirates is not part of the arrangement so far.

This will cost you AED 99 ($27) per passenger including one piece of luggage. Additional luggage will cost AED 40 per piece ($11).

The service is provided by DUBZ – an initiative by dnata. DUBZ also provides check-in and baggage collection service to your home at prices starting AED 199 ($54).

If you think this is too much, there is one way to save some bucks. Instead of taking a taxi, you could take a metro from the Burj Khalifa / Dubai Mall station to the airport (Terminal 1 or Terminal 3).

Final Thoughts

It would be interesting to see how many people use this service. More so when Emirates is not one of the partner airlines.

At the same time, this must have cost dnata next to nothing. It already has retail space in the Dubai Mall and also handles check-in and baggage at the airport. The only cost would be to transport your bag(s) to the airport for which the cost would be less than AED 99 ($27).