[SimonS1]

“I was at Miami last month and even there was greeted with a smile and there was hardly any queue”

The manifests had been checked well in advance. Obama, check. Cameron, check. Krug, check. Smiles all round.

[Binman62]

Hongkonglady, iit is because people care and want things to be better that they are posting here. As others have shown complaining in some countries is encouraged and normal here you will be pilloried delayed and your file will be updated…

And don’t think this is an issue that affects only those terminating here. When the terminals become overcrowded passengers are kept on planes, tis is happening now. Once off you join he crush and hoards and have to navigate the terminals without use of escalators which are switched off.

What is going on is a shambles and despite the best efforts of some to convince us otherwise, it is now the norm. Arriving off peak only reduces the wait it does not eliminate.

[Tete_de_cuvee]

How much was the Florida expansion pack to your Sim City, VirtualKrug?

[Binman62]

£12.20 was the cost of parking due to the delays this morning arrived at 0640 left 0845. UK passport holders in F off QF 1 on stand @ 0655 and not through immigration till 8.20…. 70 mins in the queue…..

[Henkel.Trocken]

Just been speaking to a colleague who returned from KL this morning, 55 minutes to clear EU channel in T3, nothing electronic working. Staff more sullen than usual.

[stevescoots]

Tête_de_cuvée- 19/04/2012 13:05 GMT

How much was the Florida expansion pack to your Sim City, VirtualKrug?

ROFLMA!

(i am more of a civ guy myself)

[Binman62]

The sky port newspaper dated April 20th has an article on page 12 headlined………No delays on second busiest day…….

The article states that 122,200 passengers passed through its terminals on Sunday 15th with the rush hour from 5am to 6 am seeing 11,700. Generally howevere the flow was 6000 to 7000 passengers per hour .

The border force ( don’t you just love the new beefed up title) are quoted as saying

“there were no significant delays at immigration. And passport control but on a couple of occasions longer queues were down to larger number of flights arriving close together, which varied from terminal to terminal”

BAA stated that’s immigration queues stayed under an hour all day…….so that ok then……..adding that they were around 30 mins during the day.

The Border Force has a service level agreement with BAA to process 95% of EU passengers within 25 mins……….ridiculously long in my view and 95% of of non EU in 45 mins……shocking….welcome to the UK….

A number of things strike me about this article.

1. This type of propaganda to the staff who work at LHR is almost certainly the root cause of why few have any concept of what it is like to transit this poor excuse for for an international gateway and doubtless leads to the pretty awful customer service that is often experienced.

2. The SLA that is in place will doubtless be measured over a year and as such at peak times we can now expect to wait well in excess of 30 or 40 minutes to enters as EU citizens and over an hour for non EU…perhaps even longer. To achieve the averages stated when some claim to pass through at lightening speed means that the other end of the spectrum must be pretty awful.

3. Someone was watching to much 24 when they came up with “Border Force” as a name…..it is aggressive,unwelcoming and threatening…..sums up the experience perfectly for me and is a sure sign nothing is going to change soon

IF YOU CAN AVOID LHR THEN PLEASE DO.

[Tim2soza]

RichHI1 – Absolutely brilliant solution. Reduce LHR to one runway and A380’s galore to Shannon.

HongKongLady – It really is that bad coming into the UK. It is bad and getting worse. It is a national disgrace. BAA’s statement sums it up. Th Border Force SLA is a joke. It should be 95% of passengers in 5 mins. And what is the penalty if they do not meet the SLA? All additional car park charges for PAX paid? Refund of LHR passenger facility fee? I seriously doubt it. And then the SLA will be enhanced to 45 mins and an announcement that 97% of all passengers are handled within the SLA. And then the charges will increase to reward this upgrade in service. And Sir Humphrey will get promoted to PM.

[Henkel.Trocken]

Binman62- 21/04/2012 08:33 GMT Interesting report, given the experiences reported this strikes me as a case of lies, damned lies and statistics.This looks like targets have been set which were already being achieved. The wait for immigration IMO ought to be no longer than five minutes for anyone under any circumstances. If they can do it in SIN, they can do it here.

[MartynSinclair]

to answer LP’s earlier question about transfering to another terminal to clear customs, this is not a problem, unless you have checked bags and a taxi waiting.

[Binman62]

Martyn is correct however knowing where there are no queues is a bit of problem as no one in authority at the border force, BAA or any airline will encourage this behaviour. T4 is probably the best option depending on time of day but the whole thing is a lottery.

What is required is root and branch reform starting with the home secretary who demonstrably does not even know what day of the week it is!

[RichHI1]

I think that there would be an outcry if the proposal to clear immigration through the Terminal with the lowset queue. The UKBF statistics on clearance would be blown out of thw water for the statistically manipulated hogwash they are and there would be a claim that security would be cmpromised as UKBF would have to keep all Terminals properly staffed in case anyone they were watching swapped to another terminal.

[MartynSinclair]

Hold yer horses Rich…………………tight!

The was asked, can you do it – the answer is yes B U T it will only work if:

1. You have no checked luggage

2. No body is meeting you

3. You dont have a car parked in a terminal car park

4. You take a guess about the q lengths in the other terminals.

I used to switch in the old 1 & 2 set up, if I parked in 2, flew out of 2 and landed back in 1 (would clear in 2).

The answer is yes you still can clear in any terminal, but hardly worth while considering 1 – 4 above!

[RichHI1]

Absolutely. I too swapped 2-1 but I was always met by driver and it would be carry on only. Swapping terminals for real benefit is not a starter for real benefit at present however it might become a legal way for passengers to protest at treatment by UKBF. I am not suggesting that people should do this.

[LuganoPirate]

Thanks Martyn, not sure if I’ll try it as I suppose there’s no way of knowing how long the queue is in the arrival terminal, unless one doubles back!

I’m usually without bags and either renting a car or using Heathrow Express. It’s very rare that I use LHR but T1 seems to have few queues when I’ve passed through. But then maybe I was just lucky?

[Author]

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