 Poster: A snowHead
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Went through London St Pancras last week. All the machines are in place, but no one was being asked to submit their details, so I just asked if I could. About 90 seconds of a photo and some fingerprints and that was it. I'm hoping that at some point down the track this will make me look clever... 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| gilo wrote: |
| Random question, we entered the EU using Irish passports as didn’t want to risk EES delays on a busy half term Saturday. As we are leaving on Friday (presumably quieter), and have our UK passports with us, has anyone managed to get EES registration done while EXITING the EU? |
Why would you want to flag up an attempt to exit the EU on a UK passport when they have no record of you entering with it? That's like to lead to a nice interview room and a long discussion with border control officers who'd like some proof of how long you've been in the EU and why you consider that to be legal.
You'll be able to explain it, and they'll be able to find the data to back up your story, but that could be a couple of hours of your life you won't get back and it could flag you up for special treatment on subsequent occasions as well. And whether they do it before or after the cavity search is a surprise you'll just have to wait to discover.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Bit tedious on the way out of Turin. BA only open the check in 2hrs before, bit earlier for club world. Everyone then queues like morons before the gates open. Finally they open a 3rd desk after 30-40mins.
They are doing the full EESstuff before the gate. Takes ages. So you don’t have long given you can’t even start to put your bags through until best case 1 hr before.
They started just scanning and stamping, without doing the photo and finger print stuff from us. Clearly the queue behind was looking worryingly long…
We always board last as I can’t understand why people want to stand up as soon as boarding is called, but this time we walked straight on and it was max 1/3 full. So the conclusion is that everyone else is stuck in the passport queue.
So basically a few hours of queueing.
Don’t get distracted in duty free!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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@Badbobby, some people rush to board because it's not unusual to find all the overhead locker space filled when you get there - I've even noticed that some cattle class passengers have the nerve to put bags in the club lockers - as if using "our" toilet wasn't bad enough 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Tbf i don’t have large carry on so it isn’t a problem for me. That said, I’ve not seen a problem with hand luggage needing to checked in at the gate for a long time.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Don’t get me started on the jump up on landing and stand around for 20 mins with a bent neck!!!
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No EES at Eurotunnel Calais yesterday, in fact no sign of where they might process it.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Did Saturday to Saturday, 14th Feb to today via Memmingen in Germany. No EES on either end.
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Tbilisi Airport, Georgia
14th out, 21st back
Eyes both ways
No more than 10 mins waiting
Smooth
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@dak64, because at some point I’m convinced I’ll have forgotten to renew on time and have to use the other one. Have deliberately dated the passports 2 years apart so one is always valid but with kids renewal every 5 years I’m bound too miss one eventually!
In the end we were under time pressure so didn’t bother trying …..
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| Mike Pow wrote: |
Tbilisi Airport, Georgia
14th out, 21st back
Eyes both ways
No more than 10 mins waiting
Smooth |
Georgia not in the EU or shengen - so wouldnt be EES?
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Seemingly a lot of access points into Schengen are still not using the booths.
Rumours abound that the April implementation date will be pushed back (surely it has to be).
At what point do the authorities accept the system isn't working and that they have almost certainly purchased the wrong hardware (the booths should come with gates)?
The visa system planned for next year can't surely go ahead as planned either can it?
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You know it makes sense.
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| JDL65 wrote: |
Seemingly a lot of access points into Schengen are still not using the booths.
Rumours abound that the April implementation date will be pushed back (surely it has to be).
At what point do the authorities accept the system isn't working and that they have almost certainly purchased the wrong hardware (the booths should come with gates)?
The visa system planned for next year can't surely go ahead as planned either can it? |
It has already been pushed back to sept , allegedly this was always possible, its been claimed that its down individual countries to choose to do it and the "official" start date is still April, they aren't fooling anyone. Will it ever work who.knows ?
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| iainm wrote: |
| Went through London St Pancras last week. All the machines are in place, but no one was being asked to submit their details, so I just asked if I could. About 90 seconds of a photo and some fingerprints and that was it. I'm hoping that at some point down the track this will make me look clever... |
Is it possible to register for EES in advance if I’m not travelling? Can I just pop to St Pancras with my passport (and no tickets) to register?
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Poster: A snowHead
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Has anyone now travelled twice under EES? Does the second time allow you to skip any queues and go straight to an e-gate or similar?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| euanovsky wrote: |
| iainm wrote: |
| Went through London St Pancras last week. All the machines are in place, but no one was being asked to submit their details, so I just asked if I could. About 90 seconds of a photo and some fingerprints and that was it. I'm hoping that at some point down the track this will make me look clever... |
Is it possible to register for EES in advance if I’m not travelling? Can I just pop to St Pancras with my passport (and no tickets) to register? |
Good question
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@ecureuil, Munich and Verona, 2 weeks apart - no difference with registration both times, but it might be if the two were in the same country.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Flew back yesterday through Geneva and no fingerprints taken, so sailed through.
This was my last trip of the season, so in summary we had:
December Geneva - Nothing inbounds, fingerprints taken on return.
January Salzburg - Full EES machines check going in, nothing coming back.
February Geneva - Nothing either way.
All a bit inconsistent, obviously.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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@ecureuil,
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Has anyone now travelled twice under EES? Does the second time allow you to skip any queues and go straight to an e-gate or similar?
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there was an independent travel article this morning on my msm feed from Simon Calder, talking about this very thing. he wrote that there is an assumption that this will have been the case, indeed several people on here were talking about doing a cheap flight to the EU in oct/November to get this out the way.
But, he said that, apparently, this has never been the case, you will still need to go to a machine, but once the passport picture and your face matches the stored data, you can skip the fingerprinting.
he reports that it will take approximately 10years, for the majority of non EU travellers to have their data in the system.
will try and link the article if i can
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/eu-entry-exit-system-schengen-area-brexit-b2925052.html
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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What a farce. How much money is this costing the EU tax payer, and who can they hold acceptable for it at the ballot box?
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| ecureuil wrote: |
| Has anyone now travelled twice under EES? Does the second time allow you to skip any queues and go straight to an e-gate or similar? |
As @terrygasson says above, sadly that's not the case. Work meant a lot of travel Hungary, Germany, and Estonia in the latter part of last year, and have been out to Switzerland twice this year - each time it's essentially the same process.
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My hunch is that this is more to do with crowd management rather than the process. Far easier to send everyone to the registration booths than make them decide if they need to or not. There will (soon) come a point when when this will be slower and they will let people skip registration.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@altis, exactly - any system dealing with people has to cope with the reality that people don't follow instructions and don't prepare in advance. An example is in security scanning - large quantities of liquids in hand luggage, people with metal belts, etc who seem surprised that they're not allowed to breeze through unchallenged. Similarly, people in the EU passport queue with an African passport because "everyone else went that way", etc.
There's also the dishonest people - given an opportunity to bypass the booths and just go straight to the manned passport windows, some will do so and then will delay everyone else as they either have their photo and prints taken by real people, or they have to be sent back to the machine. That's presumably why the eGates are between the machines and the passport stamping - as a gatekeeper making sure that everyone who makes it through has a valid registration rather than just skipping the queue.
The hope has to be that on scanning your passport at the machine, it recognises that you've already registered and immediately redirects you to the eGates rather than requiring you to have a new photo (which can be done anyway while you are scanning your passport) and fingerprint scan taken. The challenge though is in the questions - do you have a return ticket, adequate funds, etc. If those are needed every time, that's the painful part. Whether that will move to a reputation-based system, e.g. I've travelled into and out of the EU 3 times in 2 months so I'm low risk and therefore don't have to answer the questions, remains to be seen. Someone coming from the UK is unlikely to present a high risk, while others may do so, and profiling based on origin and passport state is highly likely.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| ecureuil wrote: |
| Has anyone now travelled twice under EES? Does the second time allow you to skip any queues and go straight to an e-gate or similar? |
Nope. Flew Bristol - Salzburg in January and again last week. Was hoping I’d get to bypass some of the HT queues, but no exactly the same process both times.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| ecureuil wrote: |
| Has anyone now travelled twice under EES? Does the second time allow you to skip any queues and go straight to an e-gate or similar? |
No, it is all in beta testing. First they need to get you on the system. Then later the visa waiver like ETSA. Should be able to use the e-gates then.
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@terrygasson,
>he reports that it will take approximately 10years, for the majority of non EU travellers to have their data in the system.
But if the data only lasts 3 years, won't there be never ending re-registration??
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You know it makes sense.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Heading out through Turin Saturday 28th - anyone have recent experience of the EES delays there and is Fastrack worth it? cheers
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Poster: A snowHead
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| gilo wrote: |
@dak64, because at some point I’m convinced I’ll have forgotten to renew on time and have to use the other one. Have deliberately dated the passports 2 years apart so one is always valid but with kids renewal every 5 years I’m bound too miss one eventually!
In the end we were under time pressure so didn’t bother trying ….. |
No point doing it until you absolutely need to is there?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| w4hammer wrote: |
| Heading out through Turin Saturday 28th - anyone have recent experience of the EES delays there and is Fastrack worth it? cheers |
I've been through twice recently and had very different experiences.
1st between Christmas and New Year, first plane to arrive from Gatwick ... machines there but not switched on. Stamped and waved through passport control almost as fast as if they weren't there ...
2nd time 15th Feb mid-morning from Stansted. Absolute s.show. Managed to get into passport control room and queue. But it was mayhem. Machines still not switched on, but some guards doing ESS individually before stamping passports New arrivals in planes behind us had to queue outside or above before they were allowed to join the queues inside. From landing to baggage hall approx 2 hours. And we didn't have to queue to get into the room.
Didn't see any fastrack options.
Both times going home security and passport no real issues.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| w4hammer wrote: |
| Heading out through Turin Saturday 28th - anyone have recent experience of the EES delays there and is Fastrack worth it? cheers |
Fastrack won’t do you any good, I shouldn’t have thought. It’ll get you through Turin security a bit quicker, but passport control happens after that and from what I saw there was no fastrack for that.
I posted about it previously but we went through Turin a couple of weeks ago and it was crap. The international departures bit only has 4 gates but also only about 2 or 3 staffed booths and it took a long time just for one flight’s worth to get through. My advice would be, get through security and then look to get yourself through into the non-EU departures bit asap. There’s no food or drink through there, so get that first. And your flight gate won’t get announced until about an hour before you fly. But I’m fairly sure there’s only one passport control area in the terminal, so even if it’s not announced, that’s where you’ll board from.
Edit: not sure if you meant you were flying in to or out of Turin. If flying out of, then my comments stand. If flying in to, good luck. Certainly didn’t see a fastrack option, they didn’t even segregate EU passports from non-EU when we went through. It was chaos and took far longer than it needed to.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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When leaving Turin a couple of weeks ago I didn't see any exiting EES points, just stamping, we now go and get a sandwich and a drink and get through passport control asap... hopefully you get a seat 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Should probably add there are two possible passport controls when leaving Turin.
Gates 6a & 6b are on the far left when you leave security.
Gates 7-14(?) are on the far right.
Both times I left we went through 6a, and the queues were minimal.
Queues for 7+ were horrendous ... stretching back out of the "snake", through the food court and past WHSmith on 22 Feb. They did have workers in yellow vests trying to find queuers with imminent flights and move them to the front. But it was a long long queue
You should try and get through passport control asap, however do not try and pre-empt but wait for gate to be confirmed else you could find your self in the wrong area and need to re-enter Italy to get to the other place.
Also there's a small coffee/sandwich shop in 6a & 6b. It is small. Can't comment on the other gates.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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thanks for the Turin updates all _ I'll feedback on my (hopeful) clear and quick in and out
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I looked on FR24 last weekend for Turin arrivals on Sunday mornings. We're off to Sauze on Sunday 8th March, so was trying to gauge how busy it's likely to be.
Last Sunday, there were 18 (yes Eighteen!) UK arrivals between 08:35 and 11:00 plus two from Dublin. The flight we should be on in a weeks time was 19th of those 20 to land, and it was one minute early. There were no further UK arrivals till 5pm.
So either the Italians will have sorted their stuff out by the time we land, and will have dragged plenty of immigration stampers out of bed on a Sunday morning, or, more likely, it'll be chaos and we'll be at the back of a very long queue. I'm taking a coule of books just in case - War and Peace and the combined works of Shakespear, but I'm not sure that will be enough.
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Sunday is tour operator transfer day at Turin. It was always chaotic on a Sunday even before Brexit/EES, to be frank, I’ve been going to Sauze fairly regularly since my first trip in 2013. But quite how Turin handles 20 flights in 3 hours with EES, goodness only knows.
On the other hand, their baggage delivery is really rather slow too, so even if you spend a good bit of time with passport in hand you’ll probably be saving yourself time waiting for your case and skis to come out!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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My recent experience of two totally different scenarios. Scenario 1 - in/out of Geneva 1st week of Feb. EES switched off both entering and leaving but long queue’s through passport control both ways. Scenario 2 - just returned from a cruise to Spain/France. Not even passport control to get on or off the ship in port. No sign off any EES machines at any of the ports we visited. Makes the whole EES a bit of a joke if its only airports and ferry/Eurotunnel terminals.
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No EES in evidence through Innsbruck this morning, standard bod and stamp.
Nice short queues and bags out before clearing immigration
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FAQ
Still, bit off topic, sorry 
