I agree with johan rebel. It's not DYKWIA, it's priority.

I pay for Privium, it is not unreasonable to expect that they provide the promised priority services, nor is it unreasonable to expect that I do not have to wait in line behind others who have not paid for priority security.

Johan

Nice. I don't think the secondary is an issue per sé, it's just that it sends a line of bags to an agent that just... stands there? I often see the secondary agents working extremely slowly or not at all. Not sure what they are doing.

And does your privium subscription includes any sort of SLAs like how long you will wait in the queue or behind how many people?
You seem to keep ignoring the fact that you do get priority service, compared to all other pax who wait in the regular queue, so you get what you pay for.

On the contrary, some lucky regular pax get priority service, at my expense.

Johan

My latest AMS "priority" security experience was wonderful, as usual.

Privium keeps advising members to use the right-hand priority checkpoint in Terminal 1, which is allegedly less busy. Out of idle curiosity, I walked past it Sunday morning. It was a zoo. As far as I could tell, all comers were being fed straight into the priority line. I therefore continued to the left-hand side, which was empty. I mistakenly concluded that I had time for a quick visit to the Privium lounge, because when I returned a short while later it was chock-a-block with pax. There were a few priority pax in front of me, but these were waiting behind a large group of regular pax that someone had seen fit to feed into the priority lane. Needless to say, many of these behaved as if they had never seen a security checkpoint before. Worse, checkpoint #2 had come to a complete standstill, I could see a large group of pax waiting for their bags at secondary.

After a while, three of the priority pax ahead of me gave up and instead went to regular checkpoint #3 , where they simply cut in at the head of the queue. I was considering my options when an agent finally directed me to an empty tray station at checkpoint #2 . Given the scrum at secondary that was the last thing I wanted, but fortunately I saw that a tray station at checkpoint #1 had just be vacated, so I ignored the agent and went there instead. I found myself standing next to a pax who had been at least 10 people ahead of me in the queue, but she was still struggling with her bags and trays.

The only good news is that my bags were not sent for secondary, but that's probably because I had removed anything and everything that might possibly have set of alarm bells, i.e. about half the contents.

Needless to say, I sailed through three other airports today with the very same bags, which contained the very same items (yes, I did remove the liquids and the tablet).

AMS security sucks big time.

Johan

No, they are not, those regular PAX has still queued all the way behind 150 pax or so, so what kind of priority service are they are getting?

A free reduction in waiting time, at the expense of those who have paid for priority.

Johan

So you wait 10 minutes instead of 8, they wait 43 minutes instead of 45, I still don't see how they get 'priority' for free.
You still get your priority, 10 minutes instead of 45...

You completely miss the point, so permit me to explain the glaringly obvious:

Passengers entitled to priority security pay for the privilege, either directly (e.g. Privium) or indirectly (by fying frequently or in premium classes). Priority security is a premium service, and should be restricted to those entitled to it. Period.

How long regular passengers wait in the other line is irrelevant, I couldn't not care less. What matters is whether I have to wait longer because others not entitled to priority security are allowed to jump the queue.

Other airports get this, and provide proper priority security, but AMS is apparently unwilling to do so.

For example, CPH Express works just fine. They do occasionally feed small numbers of regular pax into the priority line, but only when there are no priority pax. One time a few years ago they sent half a platoon of regulars (17, to be precise) to priority just as I was scanning my BC. I e-mailed KLM in Denmark, and received apologies from the KLAF country manager (who confirmed that their priority security agreement with the airport stipulated no regular pax) as well as from Copenhagen Airports A/S.

AMS security sucks, in every conceivable way.

Johan

I didn't miss your point, I just don't agree with it, no one is jumping any queue, regular PAX still queue all the way, and only at the end of the long queue they are being sent to the first available line/belt, you as a priority PAX do not have to stand in that long queue.

I don't disagree on that, some other airports indeed handle (priority) security much better, but it doesn't mean that you are being stripped of your priority 'rights' by having few normal pax in the same belt as you.

The most annoying thing when priority lines also handle regular pax (not only in AMS but everywhere), is that regular pax are often less used to getting their stuff ready for the x-ray, thus taking longer and regularly making mistakes. That slows everyone, and it gets frustrating for priority pax used to go in and out quickly :)

Unfortunately that is not unuqiue to 'regular' passengers, there are enough 'priority' pax that fly C once in a blue moon, or get their status from their spouse who is a feequent traveller etc. and have no clue.

But even several of those adds maybe 5 minutes to the experience in AMS due to the parallel process where 6 PAX are handled at any given time, it is much more annoying in airports like NBO where it is one PAX at a time.

A little patiance is all that is required really.

We should rather agree to disagree, then.

Belaboring the same points endlessly is pretty futile, and gets boring after a while.

Johan

Attachment 29777 This morning at AMS non Schengen Priority. Took me 50 minutes to get through security and passport control. Electronic pasport gates did not work.