Birmingham airport nightmare

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ashtondav
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Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby ashtondav » Mon Mar 14, 2022 5:19 pm

Just arrived back in Spain.

but Birmingham airport was an organisational nightmare! It took from 05:30 to 06:29 from start of security to its woeful end. Pathetically inadequate staff scheduling ensured it was like a 3rd world country. I’ve always been impressed by Birmingham before but this morning was awful. At least 3 flightloads of passengers had to be taken out of the queue or they would have missed their flights.

No change of process, just incompetence accompanied by no explanation (if any) for the imbecilic performance.

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costakid
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby costakid » Mon Mar 14, 2022 10:02 pm

It is a pain when it happens and i have experienced problems a few times since covid, 90 minutes to get through passport control going in and exiting Spain. I guess on an early flight out of UK they are still unsure how many staff to get in. I have flown twice recently from Bham and been through and having a coffee in ten minutes. Passport control going into Malaga is the worst by a long way.

Èire agus bròdùil.
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby Èire agus bròdùil. » Thu Apr 07, 2022 4:22 pm

Be very thankful that you are not flying from Dublin airport. Airlines are advising passengers to arrive 4 yes 4 hours before their flight. Things have gotten so bad that Aer Lingus are now allowing passengers who have luggage to go into the hold to check it in at the airport the evening before their flight. Reports of people missing their flights have been a daily occurrence. Long term car park is letting people park their cars 4 hours before the time they had originally booked for. And the forecast for the Easter period is that things will not improve. Interesting footnote is that the head of the Dublin Airport Authority who are responsible for this fiasco is Dalton Philips. That name may be familiar to some English people on this forum. In 2015 he was fired by Morrisons having come close to running the supermarket giant into the ground.
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The older I get the better I was.

1bassleft
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby 1bassleft » Thu Apr 07, 2022 7:37 pm

The Manchester airport stories are also headline news. Fortunately, we went AGP-MAN (not the other way around) today and very early in the morning. No hitch or holdup at all. Tbf, so many staff have been furloughed then laid off over the last two years and getting them back isn't so easy when they find less stressful and unsociable jobs in the meantime. The real bottleneck appears to be the bit where you disgorge your bag, take off your boots, place ancient Nokias like ducks in a row, and put your e-cig in a polythene bag for 90 seconds - which does make me wonder why expensive scanners are bought in the first place.

Although I have, in the course of decades, come across some rude and stressy MAN ops, it's a fairly low % given what they're expected to look out for and their staffing levels. I don't help, by often forgetting I stuck a bottle of Harrogate Spring in the rucksack that I've just shoved onto the belt. This Easter has been the first real opportunity for a lot of people to get away and a lot of senior management didn't see it coming. Even then, I'll cut them some slack because there's been a lot of "can you, can't you..." over the last year at least and not encouraging forward planning and recruiting.

elusive
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby elusive » Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:27 pm

Not surprised they cant get the staff. I had work collegues whose first jobs were working a security at LBA the wages were vertually minimum wage. Not bad for helping to make sure bombs dont get on a plane!

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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby 1bassleft » Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:59 pm

I didn't realize the conditions were as bad as that, but I was at LBA many years ago and my young kid asked why we had to do all this stuff and I (totally over-explaining parent) mentioned that we'd just gone into amber alert that meant an attempt at an attack was more likely. In my peripheral vision, I could see an Op and she was almost semaphoring "somebody today actually realizes it's not just us being officious gits"

I'm not saying it's always justified, but it's definitely the case that traffic-light colours are announced in Westminster and (I believe) exactly the same staff ratios have to deal with it.

scotty
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby scotty » Thu Apr 07, 2022 10:33 pm

Èire agus bròdùil. wrote: Thu Apr 07, 2022 4:22 pm Be very thankful that you are not flying from Dublin airport. Airlines are advising passengers to arrive 4 yes 4 hours before their flight. Things have gotten so bad that Aer Lingus are now allowing passengers who have luggage to go into the hold to check it in at the airport the evening before their flight. Reports of people missing their flights have been a daily occurrence. Long term car park is letting people park their cars 4 hours before the time they had originally booked for. And the forecast for the Easter period is that things will not improve. Interesting footnote is that the head of the Dublin Airport Authority who are responsible for this fiasco is Dalton Philips. That name may be familiar to some English people on this forum. In 2015 he was fired by Morrisons having come close to running the supermarket giant into the ground.
It does look like moving office staff and security from Cork airport to Dublin may solve most of the issue although I'm glad that I'm not flying to Malaga this weekend.
By the way . . . . . . . welcome to the forum. Your user name will cause the Brits to loose sleep :) :) :)

Èire agus bròdùil.
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Re: Birmingham airport nightmare

Postby Èire agus bròdùil. » Fri Apr 08, 2022 9:00 am

Go reith maith agat for the welcome Scotty.
Irish by birth Dublin by the grace of God.
The older I get the better I was.


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