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The EU’s new Entry/Exit System (EES) brought travel “chaos” to airport border control over the weekend, with queues of up to three hours and reports of stranded passengers missing flights.
Following a series of delays and phased preparations, the biometric border control system was officially introduced across the Schengen area on Friday 10 April, and is now in place across 29 European countries.
Applying to non-EU travellers entering any of the Schengen states for short stays of up to 90 days within a 180-day period, the system replaces manual passport stamping with digital records of entries, exits and refusals of entry, while also collecting biometric data such as facial images and fingerprints alongside passport details.
Disruptions and delays
Travellers have been advised to arrive at airports with plenty of time to spare ahead of their journeys. Even so, Friday’s first day of full operations was “marked by passenger disruptions, delays and missed flights”, according to a joint statement issued by ACI EUROPE and Airlines for Europe (A4E).
For weeks, the two groups have “cautioned” about the EES “operational rollout challenges” and say that the “major concerns” are “now a reality”. They have called on the European Commission and EU Member States to “immediately introduce additional flexibility” in the operation of the new system.
In a separate statement issued on Monday, A4E was even more scathing, saying that three hours queuing at border control is not an EES “teething issue”, it is a “systemic failure”.
“Airlines are working tirelessly to get flights to their destination on time – a top priority for passengers and airlines,” A4E said. “But the EES rollout this weekend told a different story: disruption and excessive waiting time – all outside airlines’ control, leading to delays and missed flights.”
The group added that while European airlines are supportive of the overall objective of the EES to strengthen border security, “it must not mean persistent and recurring travel disruptions”.
A4E called for greater flexibility in the rollout as essential for operations to run smoothly. “The only feasible solution is for the European Commission to allow for the full and partial suspension of EES until the end of summer, where necessary,” it said.
Passengers left behind in Milan
There were many incidents of travel chaos following the full EES launch.
At Milan’s Linate airport on Sunday, there were meant to be 156 passengers booked on an Easyjet flight to Manchester in the UK. After facing hours-long queues, only 34 passengers boarded the aircraft, leaving 122 behind in Italy, who “watched their plane depart without them”, said The Independent’s travel correspondent Simon Calder.
In order to get home, one family spent more than £1,600 (€1,838) to take a connecting flight via Luxembourg, which would get them home 24 hours late.
A spokesman for Easyjet told the BBC that the border delays caused by the implementation of EES were “unacceptable”.
“We continue to urge border authorities to ensure they make full and effective use of the permitted flexibilities for as long as needed while the European Entry/Exit System is implemented, to avoid these unacceptable border delays for our customers,” the statement said. “While this is outside of our control, we are sorry for any inconvenience caused.”