Immigration at T5
 

seems that this becomes more and more a nightmare. In the early days of T5 it was ok..but it is very annoying. I have the IRIS thing but even that is not better quite often. reminds my to a third world country sometimes... is it just my impression or is it getting really worse. I am using this once a week approx..:mad:

It depends when you arrive. Early mornings are the worst times (particularly for non-EU passengers).

The T5 immigration hall is more than sufficient in terms of design capacity, but UKBA are so inefficient (and understaffed) that the queues are sadly unavoidable at present.

I do think things at T5 could be better signposted. I am British and not an imbecile but still struggle to find the correct queue - especially if I am returning to LHR but then connection to another flight.

'They' really should invest in a fast track lane for premium passengers too - transiting or not.

I agree entirely, I flew in from JFK yesterday at around 7:30am and it was ridiculous. 2 desk staff, iris and e-gates both shut an consequently a huge queue. They finally opened the e-gates (which are far less reliable than iris in my experience) but after I was most of the way to the desk and then put one more officer on the desks.

It always amazes me that passport controllers are consistently surprised by the arrival of aircraft at an airport!

I suspect it is more to do with immigration staff and potential government cost cutting/unions work to rule; not T5 design or BAA for once - I am not a lover of BAA but I do not think they are the issue here. BAA do not, as far as I a aware, have anything to do with immigration staffing levels

I read somewhere that the target is 95% of EU/British nationals to be processed within 25 mins and 45 mins for non-EU nationals. Luckily for me, IRIS has normally been working at T5.

Correct, they have no control over UKBA's procedures or operating strategy (including staffing). It's a source of much frustration at BAA I believe.

BAA are responsible for the immigration hall infrastructure (desks, lanes etc.), but UKBA are responsible for using them properly and for providing their own equipment and staff.

You mean....you mean.....you mean.....there is something WORSE than BAA ?!!?

:eek::eek::eek:

BAH

It's simply the government cuts. UKBA have had a recruitment freeze for several years now and their budget is in the process of being cut by 20% over four years. Unsurprisingly this has had a somewhat negative effect on immigration efficient at the world's busiest international airport and the recent fuss over passport checks being relaxed is the upshot of being continuously being asked to do more and more with less and less. Expect some really big whopping scandals to emerge sooner rather than later in regards to corner cutting.

I suggest three extra queues with the following costs to join them:
Super fast. £100 per head
Faster £50 per head
Fast. £10 per head
This would be a great way for the UKBA to raise money, the fees could even be changed in real time depending on the length of the free queues. :)

When the IRIS guys told me about the IRIS replacement and the likelihood of charging non-EU passport holders for registering for it, I told him that as long as it wasn't going to a scary amount (I think I mentioned £2,000 per year), I said I'd still go for it.

I don't mind if they charged for fast processing. I just do not care for the queues, especially considering how much time I would potentially waste if I had to queue every time for 30 min at LHR - that would be at least 25 hours every year (based on 50 arrivals). In reality it may be offset by the baggage reclaim on some trips, but you know what I mean!

This is why I avoid T5 (and BA from destinations where they only offer LHR flights). It's crazy - it takes me 2:30 hours to fly across the Europe and then I'm stuck at LHR during one more hour (exact time it took me from gate to Heathrow Express station last time).

It went that far that I actually prefer EasyJet on VIE-LON route (VIE is my home airport).

Since I'm 18 now I may give LHR another try with e-passport gates, but it's funny that they don't allow it to 17y old since officer won't ask you any age-related additional questions anyway.

By the way, any idea why is UK probably the only EU country that scans EU passports on arrival? I actually found out that it's faster to use National ID (which they apparently can't scan) than passport.

Because the UK is one of the few European countries that regularly checks arriving individuals against various UK and Intl warning indexes.

There is no doubt that after the recent press exposé relating to the Home Secretary putting pressure on immigration to speed things up they are now doing very thorough checks. Clearly at certain times of the day when the arrivals schedule is at its peak this impacts on how quickly customers can pass through this area.

Baa have no input into this, infact by law the area itself is handed to immigration and they run it, with no input accepted from other groups (unless they want to hear it, and usually they don't).

[QUOTE=the810;17862036
By the way, any idea why is UK probably the only EU country that scans EU passports on arrival? I actually found out that it's faster to use National ID (which they apparently can't scan) than passport.[/QUOTE]

Because the UK is not part of the Schengen Agreement and thus treats EU PAX as foreigners.