To find travel in Europe too stressful now with all the extra passport palaver

[Pavementworrier]

Why do all these new systems work so poorly? Who is getting rich on the stupid shit eye scanner things?

Please tell me soothing tales of recent visits to Europe where it was fine.

Hmm i travelled in August and didn't notice anything particularly stressful. Haven't had my eye scanned

Just got back, absolutely no problem at a except my sparkly jumper confused the body scanner so had to be patted down but no problem at all. What's the actual issue for you?

Everything seems ok. Little longer to queue customs to depart but not horrific. Mind you i only went to greece :)

The only eye scan I had was re-entering the UK with the digital passport reader which took about five seconds..quicker than a manned booth.

The new system came online in October/November.

We recently flew into and out of Austria. Took about 3 minutes extra in the queue to have fingerprints taken and then on the way back in the eye scanner was about 30 secs longer than a usual passport queue.

How many times have you travelled to Europe since this was introduced a few months ago, and on which occasions was it stressful?

Why is spending 2 minutes at a facial scanner in a European airport more stressful than standing for a minute or so in front of a facial scanner at Stansted or Heathrow?

Greece seems to be really cool about it all, actually. Spain are apparently drawing on their inner Franco of Chaos.

What’s the new system OP?

My parents went to lanzarote yesterday and said it was smoother than normal. Took under 10 minutes to get through passport control including registration for the entrance exit scheme

We spent a while queuing and Paris CDG and the scanners weren't working for everyone. No problem for me back in UK but it the scanners all hated dh and he had to be taken off for a manual check. But this was November so I think all very new still.

I literally just got back from Austria and there was no extra anything.

This time of year is quiet.

I can imagine the delays will be far longer in the spring/summer.

Ferry travel will be interesting, each person in the car will need to get out, register, get back in... its bad enough already when just a passport has to be shown, people seem to struggle with that.

650 cars/2400 capacity on the Pont Aven to Roscoff, even if each car can be done inside 2mins, the delays will be significant, it already take around 45mins to clear French customs in Roscoff.

What eye scanners?

The European Entry and Exit System (EES) relies on fingerprints and photographs of your face.

The UK did have eye scanners, the Iris Recognition Immigration System (IRIS), launched in 2004 for entry into the UK. It was scrapped in September 2013.

My dh travels in and out of Europe at least a couple of times a month. He hasn’t had any bother.

The system was supposed to be in when we went to the Netherlands by ferry but they delayed it all last minute. So currently they're not doing it. Which makes a bit of a mockery of the whole thing, how can you have an entry and exit system that just ignores certain transport types

Just looked at what France is planning and they will gradually implement a pre register system..

Registration in the EES is carried out by a border guard when crossing an external border of a Schengen Member State. Registration in the EES system may be carried out by the use of a pre-registration device: it is a technological solution allowing travelers to record the necessary data for the creation of their EES file, ahead of the actual check at the booth by the border guards.
These arrangements take two forms:

• Kiosk: in the form of a fixed terminal with self-service access by passengers
• Tablet: in the form of a mobile tablet handled by agents

So i assume either on the ferry itself and/or whilst queueing at the border once off the ferry?

Might not be too bad then...

I haven't noticed any difference pre-October (or even pre/post Brexit tbh!).

You just join a different queue 🤷🏼‍♀️ Of course it's busier in the summer holiday months than in the winter. Twas ever thus.

The Entry/Exit system is being rolled out across the EU ( Schengen ) area now.
Some places are live with it , like Tenerife.

I guess they want to troubleshoot issues with this initial roll out ahead of it being everywhere in the EU eventually.

It replaces the queue for the passport stamping.

It’s also a step on the way to having a visa like system same as the USA has with their ESTA ( or is it ETSA? ) , so if you want to travel into the Schengen you’ll apply and buy a 2 or 3 year visa. Might be called ETIAS iirc.

Over the last 40 years that I've been travelling, airports have become significantly faster to move through. Apart from Brexshit slowing things down marginally, it is way better than it once was.

@Pavementworrier I went to Portugal in December, and everything went very smoothly.

Went to the canaries recently. Absolutely fine, bit of a long queue but that was just because there were a lot of families on the plane and kids can’t go through the gates.

Went as a family of four in late October, DH went back solo in December. No issues.

Non EU now need to queue up at a machine to get eyes scanned and finger prints and answer various questions before moving on to passport control. Trouble is the machines seem to keep breaking down causing absolute chaos. (I'm not sure if there's variation by country)

And yes as pp says from October we need to buy an advance visa waiver

Thank you for the positive tales!

I'm not happy about the fact I have to get a British passport to travel to the uk this summer because of the new rules. I've only travelled on my Finnish passport since I was 18 so haven't bothered renewing my British passport and now I've got to deal with that whole palaver. And then I'm not sure how it'll work travelling with my children who only have Finnish passports - will we need to be in different queues?