Longer delay through passport control

[BobCrox]

Coming back through Plymouth the other night the traffic was very slow going through immigration. A man was holding up the traffic and only allowing cars to proceed to the available cabin when the previous vehicle was well clear. Turns out the reason was Health and Safety. The workers in the cabins were exposed to high levels of air pollution with the cars waiting close to them. Just another irritating delay.

[Gareth]

Goodness me!  Of all the explanations.  How lucky that all those staff manning the check-in booths must be working in a controlled-air environment. 🙄

[Huw Gwyn]

I wonder if I might piggy-back this discussion with a query of my own re passport control post-Brexit. I'm Welsh, as are our children, and my wife is French. For over 25 years, we've travelled in a car, going through the EU channel. If/When Brexit occurs, how will passport control deal with cars which contain both EU and non-EU nationals ? . I presume the situation occurs now, but not to anywhere near the same extent.

 

[Gareth]

Huw - I think the distinction will become irrelevant.

[Solo]

Coming through Plymouth last month on bikes there was a bloke making us go to the kiosk one at a time instead of all queueing at the kiosk. So that was nothing to do with air pollution, just slowing things down for no reason.

[Cabin-boy]

3 hours ago, BobCrox said:

Coming back through Plymouth the other night the traffic was very slow going through immigration. A man was holding up the traffic and only allowing cars to proceed to the available cabin when the previous vehicle was well clear. Turns out the reason was Health and Safety. The workers in the cabins were exposed to high levels of air pollution with the cars waiting close to them. Just another irritating delay.

Bob, I saw this on the BF Twitter feed last week. I assume from the above it was you. 

https://twitter.com/BrittanyFerries/status/1123863335508824065?s=20

I think the BF reply was fair enough as there isn't much they can do once their responsibility ends and the UK authorities take over. However, if the same happens at Portsmouth on a Saturday evening in mid-summer it will be chaos. Perhaps vehicles equipped with a stop-start system should have a separate queue. Ed

[Gareth]

I would add to that that the delays at Plymouth are nothing new.  We took ages to get through passport control from Armorique two years’ ago.  The problem is four lanes filtering down into one or two (depending on how many booths Border Control are operating).  As Ed says, this has nothing to do with BF at all, so no point in taking it out on them.

[Paully]

2 hours ago, Cabin-boy said:

However, if the same happens at Portsmouth on a Saturday evening in mid-summer it will be chaos. 

I don`t want to tempt fate but has anyone heard of this farce spreading to Portsmouth??..Mind you nothing Border Farce,apart from graft, gets up to would suprise me. You want to see the flack they get at Manchester airport.

[Gareth]

Portsmouth is already a farce.  Parking a but further back is a red herring in terms of time it takes to get a shipload of passengers through the system.  It’s all about Border Force staffing levels and number of booths open.  These problems have been plaguing both Portsmouth and Plymouth for a long time and are nothing new.

[Jim]

7 hours ago, Huw Gwyn said:

I wonder if I might piggy-back this discussion with a query of my own re passport control post-Brexit. I'm Welsh, as are our children, and my wife is French. For over 25 years, we've travelled in a car, going through the EU channel. If/When Brexit occurs, how will passport control deal with cars which contain both EU and non-EU nationals ? . I presume the situation occurs now, but not to anywhere near the same extent.

 

The brief answer is that she should be able to go through the same channel as you without an issue. Mrs Dad is Australian and was always told it was fine to go through the same channel as him. The staff on the desks have access to the same systems as each other.

As Gareth said, I don't think it will even become a question... but then again, with Brexit... who knows!

1 hour ago, Gareth said:

Portsmouth is already a farce.  Parking a but further back is a red herring in terms of time it takes to get a shipload of passengers through the system.  It’s all about Border Force staffing levels and number of booths open.  These problems have been plaguing both Portsmouth and Plymouth for a long time and are nothing new.

I believe part of this issue is around funding for Border Force staff (in turn I believe funded by the port and therefore the operators). I'm pretty sure in all of this the problem could be solved... it's just nobody wants to pay for it...

[Cabin-boy]

If BF ever get around to offering the suggested 'priority disembarkation' they will either have to limit it to the first 50 bookings (or similar) or price it in such a way that it doesn't get over-subscribed and not worth the outlay. I can't personally see it working unless they then put in place a dedicated channel which leads to all the open booths and all the other traffic is held back until the priority customers have cleared the port. Ed. 

[cvabishop]

Quote

I can't personally see it working unless they then put in place a dedicated channel which leads to all the open booths and all the other traffic is held back until the priority customers have cleared the port.

That would really make them popular!

[MichaelBF]

2 hours ago, Cabin-boy said:

If BF ever get around to offering the suggested 'priority disembarkation' they will either have to limit it to the first 50 bookings (or similar) or price it in such a way that it doesn't get over-subscribed and not worth the outlay. I can't personally see it working unless they then put in place a dedicated channel which leads to all the open booths and all the other traffic is held back until the priority customers have cleared the port. Ed. 

Not sure that that is feasible. 

[BobCrox]

18 hours ago, Cabin-boy said:

Bob, I saw this on the BF Twitter feed last week. I assume from the above it was you. 

https://twitter.com/BrittanyFerries/status/1123863335508824065?s=20

I think the BF reply was fair enough as there isn't much they can do once their responsibility ends and the UK authorities take over. However, if the same happens at Portsmouth on a Saturday evening in mid-summer it will be chaos. Perhaps vehicles equipped with a stop-start system should have a separate queue. Ed

Not me on twitter.

The problem at Plymouth is made worse by the position on the booths between a high wall and high buildings. My sailing was no where near full and the delay was what we expect with a full ship. What it will be like in summer with full sailings I dread to think.

(on a separate issue I wonder why Border Force use slow scanners when the data on the passport can be captured by a camera in 1/2000ths of a second?)

 

[Cabin-boy]

21 minutes ago, BobCrox said:

Not me on twitter

OK, two Bob's, perhaps the same sailing and with the same experience. Thanks for the extra information about the buildings which if there is no wind must create a pocket of exhaust gases which I can imagine is quite unhealthy particularly as the engines are still relatively cold and not at optimal temperatures. My idea about stop-start engines might not be feasible in that case as I tested mine this morning and it took a good 15 minutes of normal driving before the engine deemed it had sufficiently warmed up to allow the shutdown system to kick in. That probably wouldn't work at the port exit. Ed. 

[BobtheBunker]

On 06/05/2019 at 11:45, BobCrox said:

Coming back through Plymouth the other night the traffic was very slow going through immigration. A man was holding up the traffic and only allowing cars to proceed to the available cabin when the previous vehicle was well clear. Turns out the reason was Health and Safety. The workers in the cabins were exposed to high levels of air pollution with the cars waiting close to them. Just another irritating delay.

What a load of nonsense! Stopping cars just short of the booth is not going to make a blind bit of difference to the surrounding air quality, and now there is an extra person breathing in the fumes. A far better solution would be to install a fan system drawing air into the booth through a filter which would increase the air pressure inside the booth slightly and then push air out through the open window. Or a cheap instant solution – give the Boarder Force person a protective mask.

 

Bob (the 3rd)

[nodwad]

Let's face up to it,it is not going to get better in the short term or long term ,it is quicker in Dover because they do the checks in France,Plymouth  has alway been very poor getting out of the port through border control.is this not down to less passenger ferries coming in so less border control staff?has for priorityboarding / embarkation cannot seeing that will work the only benefit will be for the few who will payextra for that service but it will only be few limited numbers so back to square one.lets face up to it just sit there and simmer like the rest of us.

[Aphrodite]

Well done them.  I travel to London for work quite often and you can cut the air with a knife, I'd hate to work in a stinky old shed full of diesel and petrol fumes.

[Eriba-ist]

Docked on-time in CF at Portsmouth Friday 2.15pm. Somewhat surprised to see a sister-ship (Normandie?) discharging her load and inwardly groaned at the potential for serious delays at Immigration. Went down to our car at 2.20, drove off at 2.25 and was on the M275 at 2.50!  Huge numbers of cars and motorbikes all waiting to clear Immigration but the marshalling was very effective.  Well done Portsmouth!