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Birmingham and Manchester Airport Frequently in the news the past few weeks, there have been queuing issues and staffing issues.
Gatwick Airport has been reporting mixed news today, but many of the issues appear to be cancellations rather than excessive queues (though that’s still an issue).
Long queues at baggage drop and security have caused many people to miss their flights. Baggage drop opens up to 3 hours before your flight, but it usually takes longer than the on-time gate to queue up and go through security.
Many travelers didn’t see sympathy from airlines or staff, and people reported being told they should have gotten there earlier, even though that wasn’t possible.
When you came back, things didn’t seem to get better either. Yesterday, there were reports of a “massacre” at Birmingham Airport, with some claiming to wait hours for their luggage.
No compensation and possible rebooking fees
If you miss a flight because of a queue, it’s usually classified as your fault (or at least the airport’s fault, not the airline’s). Airlines there are not responsible for compensation or refunds.
You will have the right to rebook your flight if you can prove that you arrived at the airport at least two hours before your scheduled departure time. British Airways and Virgin Atlantic reportedly offer the service free of charge. Affordable airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair will charge a fee. In the case of Ryanair, that’s £100 per person.
This also assumes that you can find a flight with available seats on the day you want to fly out.
Half term and Jubilee weekend cancelled
A recent issue is that starting this week, the airport is expected to be the busiest since before the pandemic. However, airlines and airports did not have enough staff to begin with, and increased demand over the next few weeks means several airlines are canceling flights.
Both easyJet and TUI have canceled numerous flights at the last minute, making their already poor reputations worse.
If your flight is cancelled, you will receive an alternative or a full refund. Also, if it is less than 14 days before departure, you may be subject to additional compensation.
The minimum compensation for the flight is £125 if it is a short haul flight you have rebooked and the new flight lands two hours later than your original landing time. Compensation up to £600 for long-haul flights with longer delays.
Twitter doesn’t report long lines
Although I’ve grown to hate social media in recent years, you can still rely on it to get real-time information from angry customers.
Currently, if you search for Gatwick Airport, then filter by latest tweets Not many angry Twitter users.
Gatwick Airport reported that they were experiencing high passenger numbers.
However, the few tweets I could find from travelers seemed to suggest it wasn’t as bad as other airports.
User @hughegarty pointed out that the queue was long, but it only took 40 minutes to get through.
News coverage and Vueling
Most of the bad press that Gatwick Airport is receiving so far appears to be due to airline cancellations and how badly the airlines have dealt with it.
Passengers were reportedly trapped for six hours this morning as Vueling cancelled the flight. It appeared that passengers had checked in their luggage before the flight was cancelled, leading to confusion.
Estimated security wait times at Gatwick Airport
One of the few things Manchester Airport has done right recently is implementing a basic system of reporting estimated safe waiting times.
When I checked on Tuesday morning, all three terminals reported 30-60 minute wait times. At 1pm, they were back for 15-30 minutes.
Sadly, it doesn’t look like any other airport has implemented this system.
google trend time and real-time data
I originally wrote about airport queue times because I thought it would be possible to use google real-time data and its historical popularity times to predict how bad it would be.
Unfortunately, this isn’t all that useful, as the historical data doesn’t correlate well with the current problem. The real-time data just tells you it’s busier than usual, which is already obvious.
In the case of Gatwick Airport, Google doesn’t currently show me real-time or historical data.
flight duration
Again, my previous theory was that you could look at historical flights to see if there were regular delays, which might indicate an ongoing problem.
On my trip to Porto, this theory was a huge failure. My flight was delayed by two hours.
What I do know is that flights later in the day are more prone to delays because of the knock-on effects of inbound flights throughout the day.
General advice
My best advice for Jubilee Week is to assume the absolute worst.
As far as Gatwick is concerned, the biggest problem at the moment seems to be flight cancellations, and there’s not much you can do about it.
It looks like the airline is severely understaffed, so I’ll try to avoid checked bags. We paid for checked bags to Porto, then decided to use hand luggage and accepted that we wasted money paying for checked bags.
Twitter is your best bet for real-time reporting. News sites (my own included) always lag behind the actual traveler’s experience.
