Anyone been abroad recently and can advise about finger print checks at airports?

Sailed through Murcia in May.

Faro earlier this month was a nightmare - about 2 hours or so each way. Big queues on the way in and 2 out of 4 of us had to queue again for manual checks as machines crashed. Got there 3 hours early coming back - none of the machines working so manual checks only & had no time to spare. Monday morning flights - I think lots landed / left in short space of time, according to FB it was fine later in the day / week.

Small Airport in France in June. Pretty quick, but I was fortunate enough to be toward the front of the initial queue on arrival. I think the people last off the flight probably had 40-50 minutes to queue. That was prints and a photo.

On departure we went through to the lounge as quickly as we could. That was a two minute queue (if that) and they didn’t take/check prints or photo, it was just a standard look at our passports.

Took 3 hours last night in Spain .....

I’ve been to Spain twice, no ques - family que separate and took about 5 mins max. Each of our finger prints and faces were scanned both ways.

Me too, I was dreading going because of this but no, no fingerprint coming or going 2 weeks ago.

The ‘horror stories’ are exaggerated clickbait nonsense. It’s fine now. Things have ‘settled down’ & are working smoothly.

We breezed through pretty quickly in Malta in April and in Salzburg last week. Despite having now used this system four times (in and out on two holidays) I am still baffled by it. There seems to be no particular logic about when you are fingerprinted, say. In Malta they took fingerprints in both directions, in Salzburg only on the way in.

Arrivals at Faro took just over an hour in June for Non-EU. Departures was less than 5 mins.

I think we were unlucky in that loads of planes had landed in a short space of time, so the queues were outrageous. My sister and BIL came early evening on the same day and it took them about 20 minutes!
(But I had read to expect long queues at Palma)

Took almost an hour in the passport queue when I landed in Zurich in May. 😡

But Turkey in June waved us straight through and Greece sent us to the EEA queue (which we thought we might get told off about but nope) and we were through in 5 mins. Norway this month took 10 mins and I got quite a grilling about my plans while there. I’m used to being grilled on arrival in the US but historically Norway has been quite relaxed. No longer it seems. Don’t even get me started on the OTT security search of my hand luggage when I was trying to leave Norway.

Because it is nothing to do with the US

This whole thread is bending my mind, thanks for reassuring me I’m not going mad 😵‍💫

I went on the 11th June and it took 15 minutes
what a difference!

We went to Majorca in first week of July (on a Saturday if it makes a difference) and queued at Palma, for 2 hours to do fingerprints. (2 adults, 2 teens)
There were lots of staff on hand to assist.
When we left there were no problems at all.

All the horror stories are the reason my husband hasn’t booked Europe this year. Is it likely to get easier next year once things settle down?

I’d suggest allowing way more time than before when leaving the EU country, because they may have minimal manned desks to process passengers on the way out.

(Looking at you Copenhagen, although they were prioritising people with flights departing soon).

The ones in Palma are in rows so you could go side by side and your daughter will stay close to you. There are staff on hand to help put your passport the right way etc.

Not really rhe fingerprint machines issue, more the in person chexks on the way back.

Did malaga in December and April, December once fingerprint on machines, 5-10 mins on the passport check, back the same.

April -/going there, OK 20 mins as we had the kids, coming back, horrendous we arrived 3 hours before, the passport queue snaked though the whole departures area, took 90 mins, but luckily we arrived fairly early. And still had 20 mins before boarding. fair play to the staff for trying to manage immediate flights and letting people cut the queue.

Madrid in December was beyond horrendous in the way back, no help, the passport control snaked round and dealing with long haul and short haul passengers. Eu queues empty with 5/kiosks and officers staring blankly whilst 3 kiosks for the rest of the world , we jumped as best we could and ran for our flight, many people didn't make the flight. Didn't have the kids this time round..would not have made it

How are these kiosks set up? Can I stand next to my 14yo daughter to help her navigate her way through it? We're going to Austria in a few weeks (Salzburg) and she has a tendency to panic with things like this.

This doesn't have anything to do with UK airports, it's an EU system for entering/leaving the Schengen area.

I flew into/out of Palma in June - no problems whatsoever, took about 10-15 minutes on arrival (we have a toddler so can't use the e-gates but only had a short wait for a manned desk after doing the fingerprint/photo bit) and probably similar on leaving. They had lots of kiosks for doing the fingerprints and plenty of staff to tell people where to go. We arrived at the airport earlier than normal for the flight home to allow extra time in case of long queues - 2.5 hours before the flight - but the bag drop desks weren't even open when we got there so it didn't really make a difference! Flight out was early on a Monday morning and back was around lunchtime on a Wednesday.

We went to Paris a few weeks ago and it was absolutely fine. I’d heard loads of horror stories about CDG but we were straight through, just showed our passports and weren’t asked for fingerprints or anything. Return flight was the same

Did them in the ibiza a couple of weeks ago - absolutely flew through. We were off the plane and out of the airport with our luggage in less than 30 minutes.

Took 20/25 mins to queue & get through the passport gate in Ibiza this week, including doing finger prints.

I travel a lot. I've seen no queue at all right through to a 4 hour nightmare. Somebody literally died waiting in a queue in Lanzarote!

Despite a UK passport I sail through the EU line though 😊

Went through Palma Mallorca earlier this month and I was worried it would be chaotic and busy after reading reviews. It was a breeze,, they have loads of the machines and we walked straight through. It was a Tuesday about 4pm so possibly.not the busiest day. The return the following week was also v straightforward. Longest wait was for the cases to arrive.