peterrabbit

You don't need to re-register a new passport with IRIS to keep using it.

(Not that you could if you did need to ;-)

GaryK84

T5 this morning: two IRIS machines showing green arrows, but one cordoned off. A two-minute wait and through I went!

Cyba

T1 this morning. One machine working, noone in the queue, got through in about 3seconds (admitedly it felt like i had the whole terminal to myself). Still dreading the day when my IRIS registration expires.

stifle

Doesn't your registration automatically renew for two years whenever you use the machine to get in? If that's the case, I suspect IRIS will have ceased before your registration does.

James S

T5 yesterday Tuesday one of the two machines working, 2 minute wait at about 8am.

Note I have had a new Australian passport issued because the old one was full; IRIS still works fine but the old passport was valid to 2016 (I registered for Iris in 2007).

PWOZUK

Evidently not ......

T5 Wed 1st Feb arrival from DFW circa 07:15am

Left hand Iris "working", Right Hand cordoned off but lit up.
BIG queue (compared with past experience) of 15+ poeple.

Quite a few rejects. Lots of people waiting ages for gates to open because they were not standing in exactly the right place.

At this point I should mention that I have been using Iris three or four times a year and have forgotten how many years ago I registered, at least 4 ?

When I registered I was specially told to make sure I had my bags "in front of me" so the system did not think I was trying to sneek someone through behind me.

So I eventually get inside. I'm average height 5'10 ish. During the long wait I have read the paper note stuck on the side that says that as of some date in 2006 under 18's are no longer welcome to use Iris .... if only I was so lucky.

In I go - Iris lights up, greets me and presumably decides that I am my baggage, since the lowest possible arrow/window lights up for me to squint at.

I squat down and try my best to look good - much forward/backwards/click click and then nothing. Just a blue arrow. By this time much nattering behind me that I need to be registered.. which as a previous regular user I of course know.

Still, once the Blue arrow lights then is no recourse. I watch whilst a few more struggle through - albeit accepted at various camera heghts. At least I wasn't the only one presumably needing amputation below the knee.

Now for the clever bit. I hold back, and then think - time to try again.

In , doors close - I wait - NOTHING. No camera panels light up, no words of torture, no action at all. Not even a Blue Arrow.

Eventually I spy the green (?) emergency exit button and retreat, muttering "but I am registered" as I proceed back past the growing queue.

Now I have to delight at fronting up at an EU holder desk without a landing card and with my non EU passport (I'm Iris'd remember -so I don't "do" landing cards). Venting my wrath at the (mis)management of Iris as politely as I can, I am informed that Iris will have automatically de-registered me if I have not used it within the last 3 months.

First I've heard of that excuse - and a quick calculation reveals that my last Iris scan was Oct 2011 at LGW, since my entry in December at T3 was manual due to travelling with my non-iris'd daughter. I request directions in how to make a formal complaint ... and am directed to knock on the door labeled Chief Immigration Officer ... in fact someone arrives to go in and saves me knocking, and soon I am facing another official, who is clutching a post-it note with a website to file my complaint on. They have never heard of the alleged "3 month" rule either. I ask how I can ascertain whether or not the system still has me "registered" so as to avoid confusion/frustration/walk of shame in the future.

This is clearly a most difficult question - as I have already noted that the registration offices are invariably closed .. and indeed acknowledged with the "not enough staff" excuse.

So does anyone know of an off-line means of verifying one's registration status ?

So - frustration vented - and my sincere apologies to anyone who was in the line behind me. Clearly time to write to Mr Soames as my local MP, who at least doesn't write back on post-it notes.

RB211

Yup - similar experience for me last week at T5. I know my last IRIS use was more than 3 months ago. When I registered they told me that I would need to be "inactive" for 2 years before I was deregistered.

I imagine there is no way to find out if your IRIS registration is still active or not, other than by trying it and it working. A website where you enter your passport number and some other details and it comes back and tells you your status is way to much to ask.

IRIS was a great idea; shame that budget cuts and lack of interest by UKBA will mean dying a long, slow, painful death... not for IRIS itself, but for its users!

rb211.

LTN Phobia

I *think* non-EU passport holders' registration has an expiry date and it is not automatically renewed upon use. This is what the IRIS registration people have told me anyway.

If you have the registration printout, it will tell you what your expiry date is.

Roger

From FT discussion elsewhere (Travel Safety/Security? UK & Ireland?) I thought that the 2-years-of-non-use-to-expiry was automatic for UK passport holders (and presumably for EEA + Swiss) and that non-EEA + Swiss passport holders needed to re-register when their finite term had expired, i.e. after 2 years.

The three months non-use mentioned is the first I'd heard of it and frankly I don't believe that it is true. It's a pity that we can't see the rules online.

Souvlaki

I have a 5-year entry clearance but was told that I need to re-register for IRIS at 2 years. Lamentably, my passport expires at less than one year from registration so we'll see in March whether I'm hooped or not. Nothing better than having a non-EU passport, no IRIS and arriving 3 minutes behind an Emirates 777...

stifle

The 3 month thing is just a UKBA person making stuff up. Mrs. stifle had the same problem; she was told her registration had expired last time through LHR T3 where I had (a) registered before her (b) last used IRIS at the same time as her and (c) gotten through successfully immediately before her on that occasion.

Nightbus to Dalson

Coming through T3 early with no one in the hall at all so I used the normal channel and mentioned Iris to the officer on the desk. He said 'enjoy while it lasts"
I will miss her when she's gone!

Frequentflyer99

The real question to be asked is why Iris's replacement is such garbage. Recently in T3, I got through the e-reader 2nd go, Mrs FF99 3rd go and Miss FF99 was rejected entirely although she has a biometric passport and is over 18. No rhyme nor reason to this.

Had the 2 immigration muppets employed sitting watching the process actually been manually processing us, it would have taken half the time. A vision of things to come and enough to make a strong man weep !!!

I wonder how long it will be until there is a thread bemoaning the loss of the e-readers, when they are replaced with the next expensive white elephant.

Expatbear

T5 yesterday PM was similar scenario: only rh lane in service, lh one cordoned off but had a green arrow like it would have worked.

My registration was ages ago actually and I'm still in the system it seems!

Moomba

I registered not long after it first started and have never had to re-register. I think if you have indefinite leave to remain or right of abode you don't need to re-register. The two year limit on use of IRIS falls in nicely with the two year absence allowed before an indefinite leave becomes in invlidated.