More anecdata: arriving off JL44 at 17:20 on Sunday 15th December, the passport control queue filled about half of the immigration hall, but it moved constantly we were through in about 15 minutes, by which time our bags were already on the carousel. We would have been quicker, but the immigration officer somehow managed to overlap my entry sticker with one from a previous visit and creased the barcode, then he took several minutes trying to peel it back off without ripping my passport pages before giving up.

Customs was chaos of people not knowing where to go but very small queues. It took more time to slalom through confused people and baggage trolleys than it did to go through the automated gates.

Even the JR office in the arrivals area only had 2 people in the queue (perhaps mostly due to the massive JR pass price increases last year).