Europe's new border snags
A new EU entry‑exit system requiring biometric registration has caused long queues and some travellers to miss flights, with at least one family saying they spent £1,600 to get home after an easyJet flight left without them. (independent.co.uk) The system now asks non‑EU nationals to register fingerprints and facial biometrics on first entry, and passengers report two‑hour waits and uneven kiosk/staff performance across airports. (independent.co.uk)
Europe’s new digital border checks are slowing some airport lines enough that passengers are missing flights, days after the European Union made the system fully operational on April 10. (independent.co.uk, ec.europa.eu) At Milan Linate on Sunday, April 12, an easyJet flight to Manchester left with only a fraction of booked passengers on board after passport-control queues stretched for hours. The Independent reported that more than 100 passengers were left behind, including a Leeds family that said it spent more than £1,600 getting home via Luxembourg. (independent.co.uk) The family, Max Hume, 56, Lynsey Hume, 46, and their 13-year-old son Archie, told The Independent they had arrived nearly three hours before departure after already facing a two-hour queue entering Italy a week earlier. They said easyJet staff told them rebooking on the next available flight, five days later, would cost £330. (independent.co.uk) The new system is called the Entry and Exit System. It replaces passport stamps with a digital record for non-European Union nationals on short stays and logs passport details, fingerprints, facial images, and each entry or exit. (ec.europa.eu, consilium.europa.eu) For first-time users after rollout, the slowest step is registration. European Union travel guidance says border officers take a facial photo and or fingerprints at the first crossing, while later trips are meant to need only a quicker verification. (travel-europe.europa.eu, ec.europa.eu) The Entry and Exit System did not switch on everywhere at once. It began a six-month phased launch on October 12, 2025, and the European Commission said full implementation across 29 countries was reached on April 10, 2026. (travel-europe.europa.eu, ec.europa.eu) That phased start helps explain why some travelers are only now hitting the full process. European Union guidance said passports could still be stamped during the transition and biometric collection was not introduced at every border point right away. (travel-europe.europa.eu, travel-europe.europa.eu) easyJet said the Milan disruption was “outside of our control” and that it was trying to support affected passengers, according to reports cited by Yahoo and the BBC. Passengers quoted in those reports said automated checks were not working consistently and some people became ill while waiting in the heat. (yahoo.com, telegraph.co.uk) European Union officials say the system is designed to tighten external-border checks and automatically spot people who overstay the 90-days-in-180 rule for short visits. For travelers, the immediate lesson is simpler: first entry now takes longer, and airports are not handling that extra step equally well. (ec.europa.eu, ec.europa.eu)
