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45 minutes to check in this morning at Manchester airport

45 minutes to check in this morning at Manchester airport

Old Jan 8, 2020, 12:14 pm
  #151  
 
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Originally Posted by xenole
It's health & safety.
Staff are not supposed to lift customers bags in case they cause an injury to themselves.

Yes, a frail old lady struggling with her case isn't generally a good thing, but if you pick that case up and pull a muscle or something, then you're not able to work and various handling agencies tend to put the onus on you for doing something you were told not to ever do, and you end up the loser in the situation.

.
I get that- they were laughing at her- and then when I went help there were some comments along the lines of give it some wellie love. She was visibly upset.
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Old Jan 8, 2020, 12:16 pm
  #152  
 
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Joined the fast track security line at MAN T3 this evening. One passenger ahead of me. Generally very quiet in the security area... Somehow the staff still contrived to manage for it to take 35 minutes for me to get through. One of my trays was sent for secondary although it just had my lightweight coat in it. One staff member working on secondary screening with maybe 10 trays in the line and moving so glacially that I was wouldnt have been surprised to see cobwebs growing on her. Another member of staff just watching her. Eventually they get to my tray to tell me it didnt scan properly the first time so it has to go through again. 35 minutes in a half empty security area, with fast track. Truly impressive!!
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Old Jan 8, 2020, 4:04 pm
  #153  
 
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Originally Posted by Barnaby100
I assume this is a joke. I went through fast track. Got to 2nd in the queue. The 1st person pointed out they were fast track. The security person objected to this and said something along the lines of you will go forward when I say you go forward and if I say wait you wait. So we both had to wait whilst the whole of the non fast track went through.

So never inform them that you are fast track!

I wasn't surprised. Typical Manchester security attitude in my experience.
No, it is not a joke!
T3 is not fit for purpose - We could go on all day! They run the fast track into the normal queue and thats wrong. Theres a separate
scanner que for crew and kids. Again wrong. You should (respectfully) let the CAA know and Andy Burnham as City Lead of your experience.

I shall be through the MAN Hell in two weeks - If I have a problem I shall find a security manager (white/pinkk shirt)


Far too many here on FT pap on and don't address the issues they raise without direct redress to folks concerned!
T

Last edited by Telecasterman; Jan 8, 2020 at 4:19 pm
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Old Jan 8, 2020, 5:22 pm
  #154  
 
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Originally Posted by Telecasterman
No, it is not a joke!
You should (respectfully) let the CAA know and Andy Burnham as City Lead of your experience.

T
Surtprised Burnham as well as MUFC and MCFC aren't on this. Burnham is making as lot of noise re Northern Rail - so maybe that shocking shambles has sapped his teams energy?

Reviews here of MAN, as well as on TA are hugely negative on the city. It is a massive reputatioonal embarassment.

IME MNL T3 is better than MAN T3
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Old Jan 8, 2020, 6:16 pm
  #155  
 
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Originally Posted by xenole
It's health & safety.
Staff are not supposed to lift customers bags in case they cause an injury to themselves.


The airport is obliged to provide assistance to passengers with reduced mobility - such as this lady. How are they fulfilling that responsibility?
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Old Jan 8, 2020, 8:32 pm
  #156  
 
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Originally Posted by Modo
Surtprised Burnham as well as MUFC and MCFC aren't on this. Burnham is making as lot of noise re Northern Rail - so maybe that shocking shambles has sapped his teams energy?

Reviews here of MAN, as well as on TA are hugely negative on the city. It is a massive reputatioonal embarassment.

IME MNL T3 is better than MAN T3
Quite

People should stop posting here and raise direct - oh that means real details - !!!

Last edited by Telecasterman; Jan 8, 2020 at 8:42 pm
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 12:19 am
  #157  
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Originally Posted by Telecasterman
Quite

People should stop posting here and raise direct

I did - three times: no acknowledgement.....
.....but ALL the travelators/walkways between the station and T1 are now in use. AND the station escalator is working, too.

Little by little, and - my God! - it's slow work.



I've never encountered out-and-out rudeness in the security arena. Perhaps my skin has thickened, and i can see why orders are shouted and there's a certain brusqueness of manner. They are dealing with an awful lot of very infrequent travellers, all in holiday mode.

But face to face I've found most agents helpful - and not one has been impatient at me placing everything that has caused "a secondary" out of my bag, in an armada of trays so that not a single article overlaps or touches another (thereby offending the remote God who decides things). Those articles includes an electric toothbrush, cables and a tube of fizzy vitamin tablets - as well as the normal stuff.

I don't need to do this level of sorting at any other airport I travel through. I've shared this with supervisors and managers, they've explained a few things - including exasperation with the technical level of equipment they use, and they way they are mandated to use it. Which puts things beyond my technical level, but given the state of infrastructure in the rest of the airport, I'm willing to take the managers' evaluation.
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 12:49 am
  #158  
 
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Continually the worst experience in the world for me. Such rude staff who are indeed bullies that would be taken to court for bullying in any other job
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 1:18 am
  #159  
 
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MAN is the only airport I've been to that needed my shoes to be X-rayed (excluding US airports), even after an agent before said they were fine.
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 1:27 am
  #160  
 
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Originally Posted by Telecasterman
No, it is not a joke!
T3 is not fit for purpose - We could go on all day! They run the fast track into the normal queue and thats wrong. Theres a separate
scanner que for crew and kids. Again wrong. You should (respectfully) let the CAA know and Andy Burnham as City Lead of your experience.

I shall be through the MAN Hell in two weeks - If I have a problem I shall find a security manager (white/pinkk shirt)


Far too many here on FT pap on and don't address the issues they raise without direct redress to folks concerned!
T
I respectfully suggest that if you really believe that writing a letter of complaint in that good old British way will do one iota of good then you are quite wrong. Customers are rightly also fearful of complaining in person at the time as they are likely to be picked on for worse humiliating treatment and verbally bullied.
i fly through multiple uk airports regularly and of necessity have to use a Manchester and have learnt to add an hour to the journey as s buffer to deal with the fascist tyrants employed as security at Manchester T1 and T3. Frankly I dont care what their excuses are for the ludicrously high level of secondary screening and verbal harassment of passengers. As has been said before, Im surprised the politicians and press arent applying pressure here
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 1:47 am
  #161  
 
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Originally Posted by realgaga
MAN is the only airport I've been to that needed my shoes to be X-rayed (excluding US airports), even after an agent before said they were fine.
Liverpool is the same.
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 2:20 am
  #162  
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Originally Posted by Barnaby100
2nd incident. Unload grab bag. Kindle is in there and I put in back. Security person shouts at me that my kindle needs to be in the tray. I ask if rules have changed recently. He replied that kindles have to be removed at every airport in the world and always have been and quotes some legislation. I smile and say thanks.
The issue here is the definition of "tablets", which in the UK (mostly) and rest of the EU (mostly) need to be removed from baggage and placed clearly separated and flat on the scan tray. Broadly there have been no changes in this area for 13 years. However what is a tablet? The DfT have given much more detailed guidance and to cut a long story short, some e-books are considered tablets, such as the Fire range, and some are not - due to their size mainly. There is a further complication that some older e-books have a large but thin battery on their base which could be something of interest.

Manchester processes 30 million passengers, and there really isn't time, people and space for the security staff to engage in conversation or even a brief discussion on the ins-and-outs of a policy over which they have no control. Moreover it is not realistic for fine-tuning tablet sorting, no one is going to dig out the DfT guidelines for you. Even if 0.0001% of passengers challenge staff (and the number who try is much higher) then rapidly the system, such as it is, will fall to pieces. This does not, of course, excuse rudeness, but rudeness is a subtle thing, different people have different sensitivities. There is, however, no point trying to challenge the process, it is what it is.

I imagine your motives in asking if there have been any changes is purely inquisitive and innocent, but this isn't an unusual challenge that staff will get, and it can be linked with the time-old statement "but this bag has worked all over the world". As I say there isn't scope for this dialogue at large airports and it's frankly a waste of time as to what comes out of it. Hence the system is based on brusque compliance to keep the process running.

In short it really is best to follow instructions and by all means contact the airport afterwards to give feedback.
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 2:33 am
  #163  
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Originally Posted by Barnaby100
I have seen them stand and openly laugh at an elderly woman who couldn't lift her suitcase (that wasn't security that was onto the belt after check in- checked luggage) as they stood and watched. As I went to help her they laughed at us both (I was recovering from surgery- I did post about it at the time)
Originally Posted by Barnaby100
I get that- they were laughing at her- and then when I went help there were some comments along the lines of give it some wellie love. She was visibly upset.
You keep adding more and more detail to your complaints. In the original post, it was an old man, and you mentioned nothing about comments or being laughed at.

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/28674391-post8.html

Originally Posted by Barnaby100
I did this 2 weeks ago-ORD then SAT. Arrived about 3 hours before flight. There was 1 desk with 2 counters open. There was a small queue. Was unable to check in on line in either direction as they said my documents had to be checked at the airport (UK passport with esta).

My luggage certainly did not the disappear onto a belt! I have a large eastpak wheeled soft bag- they said that all soft bags had to be taken by the passenger to another belt. I questioned this and was told it was standard manchester practice. You had to upload them yourself whilst 2 guys on the desk/belt watched. The belt was quite high and it was a definite lift not a pull/push. I also ended up lifting the bag of the old chap behind me. I was very non plussed that they just watched while travellers clearly struggled and based on this alone I won't be flying with AA from Manchester again.

Last edited by NWIFlyer; Jan 9, 2020 at 2:53 am Reason: To comply with rule 12
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 5:14 am
  #164  
 
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Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave

In short it really is best to follow instructions and by all means contact the airport afterwards to give feedback.

That's exactly what I do, c-w-s.

I've been through MAN T3 over 40 times in 2019 and started my 2020 saga yesterday.

I have to say that generally the staff at the conveyor are friendly enough and I don't think I have ever been shouted or barked at by them, but yesterday was in a class of its own for the almost painfully slow movement of the one member of staff in the secondary screening area - with another member of staff literally just watching her. It was like watching a film in slow motion or like being in Kafka's "The Trial"

I just waited and waited, until I had to ask one of the managers politely to add another member of staff to the secondary screening, which they did without challenge.

Once I'd got through to the BA lounge, I wrote to MAN Airport through their "contact us" form. I also wrote to BA to advise them of the overall situation at MAN now that it's all Menzies and I suspect they're told all is fine once per month at their partner review meetings (or however frequently they meet)

I don't think that any other approach would work and it's not worth raising the blood pressure!
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Old Jan 9, 2020, 8:10 am
  #165  
 
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Just passed through Fasttrack at T3. Bag taken for secondary for liquids even though there wasnt a drop of any liquid in the bag. There were at least a constant stream of bags being pulled for secondary just on my line number 5.
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