New EU border system tripling time at passport control, airport boss says

What the report says

BBC World News reported that the European Union’s new Entry Exit System is adding significant delays for some non-EU travellers at passport control, with a senior official at Rome Fiumicino Airport saying processing times for UK nationals have risen from about seven minutes to roughly 20 minutes even after operational changes. Ivan Bassato, the airport’s chief aviation officer, said the integration of biometric registration into passport e-gates had helped, but that the system still needed urgent fixes.

The EES, being phased in since October, requires non-EU citizens entering the 29-country Schengen area to provide fingerprints and a facial image, which are checked when they leave. BBC reporting from Rome and other airports described travellers encountering long queues, with some passengers saying waits ranged from around 45 minutes to two hours. Ryanair has also advised UK passengers heading to Europe this summer to allow more time because of longer waits at border control.

At Faro Airport in Portugal, border police official Pedro Oliveira told the BBC that queues that once took about 10 minutes can now exceed 30 minutes, though he said delays of more than an hour were uncommon there. He also said the technology had experienced bugs, including wider server problems affecting multiple member states, but that these issues were becoming less frequent.

The European Commission said disruption remains limited in most EU airports and that it will keep supporting member states as the system is introduced. Airports and airlines have sought more flexibility to suspend EES during peak periods, but the BBC reported that a recent meeting produced no policy change.