US passport holders are joining British travellers in finding that their European travel plans are being disrupted by Brussel’s new Entry Exit System (EES).
Hundreds of non-EU travellers reportedly waited for hours at airports in Gran Canaria, Malaga and Lisbon last weekend as they tried to enter or leave Europe’s Schengen area using the new digital border system.
The EES, fully rolled out across 29 European countries on April 10, requires travellers to provide fingerprints and photos alongside a passport scan.
CNN star reporter Clarissa Ward said she missed her flight from Lisbon airport on Tuesday after standing in ‘the longest line I have ever seen in my life.’
“Truly, this system is completely broken,” she added.
Traveller Craig Hackett said he arrived three hours before departure and checked his bag at the earliest opportunity at Lisbon airport, and still faced ‘enormous’ queues that saw him fail to reach the boarding gate in time.
“As a result, we and at least 15 other passengers missed our flight through no fault of our own,” he said.
The EU’s digital border checks are mandatory for all non-EU travellers, including Americans, Canadians and Britons.
Earlier this month, airlines including Ryanair and EasyJet called on Spain, France and other EU countries to pause the system until September after hours-long passport control queues were reported over the May bank holiday weekend.
Ryanair COO Neal McMahon said: “As a result of this half-baked system rollout, passengers are being forced to endure excessive passport control queues and, in some cases, miss flights.”
The European Commission said on Wednesday it would ‘help EU countries’ with the EES system, shortly after rejecting claims that it was directly responsible for the lengthy queues.
“Several causes can create delays, which are often unrelated to the operation of the EES,” one EU source told Portuguese outlet Lusa.
The source added that EES registration ‘takes just over one minute on average.’
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