Europe travel chaos as new EU border system collapses with tourists missing flights | World | News

Travellers flying to Europe have described the EU’s new digital border system as “pure chaos”, with videos showing long queues at airports in Spain.

The next time you travel from the UK to Europe, you might notice some changes. A border guard won’t stamp your passport. Instead, an automated kiosk will collect your fingerprints – after you’ve stood in a long queue watching smug EU citizens pass through in a matter of seconds.

The EU’s new biometric border entry system, called the Entry/Exit System (EES), requires non-EU citizens to register their biometric data like fingerprints and a facial image when entering the Schengen Area for the first time.

Airports started rolling out the system on October 12 to strengthen border security, and it will become mandatory in April. But in practice, the clunky system is reportedly causing delays and almost making tourists miss their flights.

The UK consumer group Which? sent writers to test the system, according to the Mail. One writer trying to depart Gran Canaria almost missed their flight home because of faulty scanners.

Staff are hardly championing the fingerprints-based border system, said Which?. A border guard in Alicante told one reporter they’d experienced major problems while testing the technology, saying: “It’s terrible, it has a lot of problems”.

The system includes many popular destinations for UK travellers, such as France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece.

The reason for rolling it out is to combat identity fraud, identify potential threats and reduce illegal migration. It will help the EU stop visitors overstaying.​

The Spanish Ministry told Which? they had experienced no major problems so far.

“It was pure chaos. The EU queue just whittled down normally but the queue for UK passport holders was moving at a snail’s pace. It must have taken about 45 minutes to get to the part of the queue where I could see the gates.”

He adds: “Then it was havoc. One of the flights made a last call and people started pushing to the front. I was literally watching people getting pushed back by airport security as they were trying to push past.”

Passengers were “shouting and crying” as it became clear they wouldn’t make their flights.