Airport operators asked for patience and apologized for the delays as frustrated travelers took to social media to post photos of long lines at airports including Manchester in the north of England and London Heathrow, Europe’s busiest airport. Travel is expected to be especially busy over the next few days as a three-day weekend coincides with the start of a weeklong holiday for most schools in Britain.
“We are aware of a nationwide border system issue affecting arrivals into the U.K.,” the Home Office said in a statement. “We are working to resolve the issue as soon as possible and are liaising with port operators and airlines to minimize disruption for travelers.”
The problems, which began Friday night, come as UK airports, airlines and ferry operators try to rebuild goodwill with the public after a series of glitches caused travel chaos last summer when foreign travel surged following the coronavirus pandemic.
Electronic passport gates are automated self-service barriers that are designed to speed up processing of travel documents. Using facial recognition technology, the system verifies a traveler’s identity against the data stored in the chip in their passport.
There are now 270 such gates at 15 air and rail ports in the UK, according to the Home Office. They are open to anyone over the age of 12 who holds a passport from the UK, any European Union member country, Australia, Canada, Iceland, Japan, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland and the United States.
About 86% of the people who enter the UK each year are eligible to use the electronic gates, according to the Home Office.
Heathrow and other airports promised to do what they could to ease congestion.
“We are aware of a nationwide issue impacting the eGates, which are operated by Border Force,” Heathrow said in a statement. “This issue is impacting a number of ports of entry and is not Heathrow specific. Our teams are working closely with Border Force to help resolve the problem as quickly as possible and we have additional colleagues on hand to manage queues and provide passenger welfare.’’
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