Anyone work at Heathrow? I have a question about arrivals...

[CautiousOptimist11]

Posting here for traffic as a bit stressed!

So, my family and I have been abroad for past year, not entirely due to our choosing, but are coming home in a couple of weeks.

We are of course adhering to testing and quarantine rules. This is not a holiday return, and not a thread for bashing travellers.

Anyway, we are quite worried about the potential 7 hour queues at Heathrow arrivals. This was reported by the BBC a week ago, at the same day and time we will be landing.

With such queues, we are concerned about Covid - being in such close proximity to others from multiple flights for so long -and with a 1 and 3 year old, it will be just awful. The idea of landing at 5pm and queuing with them until 1am is not great.

So, is it still like this, can anyone tell me? I only ask as Gatwick appears to be better (though who knows, perhaps it just isn't reported). However, if the crazy Heathrow queues are continuing, we may well try to change our flights.

A long shot but any info would be gratefully received!

Do any of your family have special needs or would require special assistance? I don't know if this makes a difference.

Other than those isolating re covid, how can they be short staffed when there are so few flights operating?

You need to ask the Home Office about manning numbers..

For overview..

There's still roughly 100-110 flights arriving per day., and they don't arrive evenly spread, there are peak times.

Only two Terminals open,
Last time looked all e-gates closed,
Fixed number of manned booths, so even if there are periods when no staff shortages there's a "choke" point..
lots of extra time to process each passenger.

I probably should add/emphasise that ending up in one of those the much publicised multi-hour queues that make the news reports is not inevitable - see my comment above about peak times.

If you look at Heatheiw arrivals, you will see loads of planes arriving, loads. 5 for every 10 minute slot at some times of day. Not sure who all these people are.....!

You need to treat the arrival boards with a bit of scepticism, since they don't indicate passenger numbers. Some flights have very low passenger numbers (but plenty of freight in the holds) , lots of other flights into Heathrow are "passenger" aircraft, using normal flight numbers but actually carrying freight only.

Travel in out of the UK for work purposes is still allowed..if you bear in mind in normal times roughly 30% of Heathrow's passengers were travelling for work/business reason but that Heathrow's passenger numbers are now down to only 10% of what they were just over a year ago you'll get some idea of how far from normal things are.

Isn't there a special queue for passengers travelling with young kids? Might be worth checking.

Just by chance today a few answers from the LHR COO:

"Heathrow Airport regularly sees queues of three hours and sometimes six hours at border control, according to Emma Gilthorpe, its chief operating officer.

The border is controlled by Border Force, managed by the Home Office.

Earlier this month, passengers complained of waits up to seven hours.

Unions representing Border Force officials said part of the issue was caused by Covid restrictions requiring immigration officials to only work in a bubble of 10.

They said this prevented more staff being deployed if the border was particularly busy.

Speaking to the Home Affairs Select Committee, Ms Gilthorpe said that, pre-Covid, the queues for EU arrivals were supposed to be 25 minutes, and 45 minutes for non-EU arrivals."

www.bbc.com/news/business-56344287

Thanks for the update, unfortunately not looking like much has changed. I'm bracing myself and absolutely dreading it... how will we keep a very strong 15 month old contained in the same spot and not running around for 6 or 7 hours
Trying not to anticipate the worst. Don"t even really want to come home because of all of this (been in a very relaxed country, amazingly), and yet having to fight and pay through the nose to do so!!!

Do you have to come home now? (genuine question).
I flew from Heathrow a few months ago, bloody check in took ages as everyone had to be checked in manually to answer covid questions. Same at Gatwick, staff were not giving helpful information and many people with connecting flights were being denied boarding from London to Spain because of rules in their destination country.
Hardly any business lounges open which is also inconvenient as many seats in the airport cordoned off.

On a practical note has the older child got atrunky style case they can sit on? Will 15 month old have a car seat?
Pack infkatable cushions in hand luggage.
I have health issues that mean I couldn't stand for that length of time so I just sit on the floor (have been stranded in a few airport situations in my time unfortunately!).

I think it's really crap to leave anyone queueing for that length of time.

Do you have to fly into Heathrow? A friend flew into Birmingham last week and had no wait to get through passport control. Probably because it’s a smaller airport with fewer flights. Or fly via eg Amsterdam and go into City.

Not a bad idea (if it's possible) , but certainly if the OP is originating from outside the EU they'd need to look at the paperwork requirements required for a transit passenger at the intermediate airport (there usually aren't normally but times are not normal).

It is just possible you could end up swapping one set of queues/issue for another so whilst it might work due diligence required.

Just been checking in with a few people who have travelled through LHR in the last 4-5 days (work purposes) and nobody queued for more than 45 minutes..

BTW quickly going back to the comment upthread about numbers arriving, arrivals boards, and lots of flights seemingly arriving together- beware of codeshares giving the wrong impression..

For example there were 4 flight numbers/airlines apparently arriving from Cairo at exactly the same time this PM...FWIW it was a codeshare...there was only one aircraft but four airlines were selling tickets on it (Egyptair, TAP, United and Air Canada).

Thank you all so much for your helpful comments and suggestions, I really appreciate it!

@Unicornflakegirl, I had thought about it, but we really do have to return now.

@Blyatiful, we were looking at other airports around London, but the flights there are so scarce they are a rush for being cancelled (many have). We dont want to waste our ticket and opportunity with an airline that is definitely flying this route several times a week.

@notimagain, thank you for checking things out with your friends. That really lifted my spirits! I know we are travelling peak time (sunday evening) but if short (45 min!!) queues exist, then I have hope

*at risk of being cancelled

@CautiousOptimist11

That really lifted my spirits! I know we are travelling peak time (sunday evening) but if short (45 min!!) queues exist, then I have hope

Fingers crossed I haven't now doomed you to a multi hour wait

Good Luck...

@CautiousOptimist11 I am desperate to get back and see my daughter, but the 10 days quarantine on arrival in U.K. and another 14 days when I get back here put me off. Not to mention the PCR test to travel to U.K., the PCR test to come back, the two PCR tests in U.K. on days 2 and 8...

Does anyone have any update on how the queues are looking at the moment? Is there anywhere that records how long you're likely to have to wait?

Unfortunately not that I know of....

I'm sorry you cant get to see your daughter @blyatiful, just a difficult difficult situation

Does anyone have any update on how the queues are looking at the moment? Is there anywhere that records how long you're likely to have to wait?

Not that I'm aware of...I'm not sure it's something that is routinely tracked or recorded.

From what I'm hearing (so Anecdata) it's highly variable but is generally under an hour, rather than multiples of hours.

@CautiousOptimist11 - I hope you arrived home safely - I know it’s been a few months, but how was the arrival process? Asking as am in a similar position to yours! Many thanks!

Hello.... amazingly smooth as we had kids. We arrived and as expected there were huge queues snaking around arrivals hall. We asked if there was a family queue and were told we would be pulled out of main queue which we joined .. but actually we soon realised there was a single family queue going straight past all the poor souls queuing so you should just go straight to that. Anyone with kids under 12 can join. This meant that it was the fastest Heathrow arrival process we have ever experienced Good luck!

@CautiousOptimist11 - hey thank you and glad you got through so quickly! I don’t have any young DC though! I’m actually flying into LGW - but thought if you had a good experience at LHR then it would bode well for Gatwick! 🤞

I recently landed at LHR around 6pm. People with kids were sent to a different queue and it took me 10 minutes to clear (UK citizens though). Even though your DH is a EU citizen you can still use the UK citizen line as a family (if you are one).

Well just to say I landed at LGW yesterday. It felt like a ghost town! There were 3 border force officers checking passports immediately after we got off the flight. No question appeared to be asked of anyone with a U.K. PPID and took about 10 seconds! At the ‘official’ passport control area we were directed through the e-gates. Picked up our baggage and straight through. Quickest I’ve ever been through an airport! Had to wait 40 minutes for DS though who hadn’t expected us to get through so quickly!

Checks were more stringent in Athens and at least one British national wasn’t allowed on the flight as did not have the correct paperwork.