Walter Finch
BRITISH travellers could face severe disruption at some of Europe’s busiest airports when the EU’s long-delayed Entry/Exit System (EES) finally comes into force.
The scheme will require all non-EU and non-Schengen visitors – including UK passport holders – to give both fingerprints and facial scans the first time they cross into the Schengen Area.
After that, only a single biometric check will be needed, typically a face scan.
The EES will begin a phased roll out incrementally from October 12 depending on each airport’s readiness, meaning coverage could be patchy at the beginning.
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But all EU airports are expected to operate it by April 10.
Airports across Spain and the rest of Europe – and also the land border with Gibraltar – have already installed rows of kiosks, currently sitting under wraps, ready to take the biometric data of planeloads of passengers.
EU planners hope that Brits flying away for a weekend getaway will be able step off a flight and file through the machines with minimal delay. But travel experts warn the reality may be very different.
“Almost every airport works fine when everything is running smoothly,” aviation analyst Oliver Ranson told Simon Calder’s Independent Travel Podcast.
“But when new systems are introduced, small glitches can make the whole arrivals process collapse very quickly.”
If bottlenecks form in arrivals halls, airports could be forced to hold passengers on planes, or even divert flights if queues spill beyond capacity.
Ranson’s modelling points to southern and eastern Europe as especially exposed to high non-Schegen passenger turnover, with Athens and Bucharest topping the list.
Italy’s Milan Malpensa and Rome Fiumicino, along with Vienna and Budapest, also stand out, while Northern hubs are not immune either.
Amsterdam Schiphol, Berlin, Copenhagen and Prague all face the same problem of third-country passengers that can quickly turn into a flood if the new biometric checks falter.
Spain does not feature in the top ten, but airports like Malaga, Alicante and Palma de Mallorca – with their high volume of UK holiday flights – are watching the rollout closely.
Each handles millions of non-EU arrivals every summer, with British passengers forming the bulk.
While Madrid Barajas and Barcelona El Prat are designed to absorb large surges of international arrivals, regional tourist airports face a different risk.
The government insists that enough kiosks and staff will be in place. But unions have already warned that extra personnel have not been fully trained, raising fears of long delays at peak times.
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Notably, two airports with huge volumes of UK flights – Paris Charles de Gaulle and Faro in Portugal – are not considered especially vulnerable.
Both receive large non-Schengen crowds but in concentrated waves. Their arrivals halls are built to handle sudden surges, making them less prone to collapse than airports like Athens or Bucharest.
British holidaymakers should expect delays, especially on peak weekends at Spain’s most popular airports after October 12.
Officials hope the system will bed in quickly, but as Ranson warns: “It only takes a small failure for things to get very gnarly, very quickly.”
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