What is with some people?

It’s not difficult, put passport in slot, look at screen.

Why does it take you 5 minutes to achieve this?

Last time i used one it wasn’t massively clear which way up/down/open/closed etc your passport should be.

My passport doesn’t work with them. It did one time when they were first installed at Manchester, but I still go in the, (shorter) queue and let if fail. Then I get sent to the front of the massive queue for the manual gate. 😀

😀

You have my sympathy ! I can verify some French have a similar affliction (you can register uk passport for e-scan) there are times it’s been quicker to queue. The Singaporean system is much faster but it has no iris scan

I used one yesterday, there is very little instructions on how to use them, only an odd 2d line diagram.

Even with the passport inserted correctly it took about 10 attempts to make it work.

Dont like the sound of that. Dont like the sound of any automated machine thats supposed to make things quicker, train tickets, shop self scan etc. No thanks. I would rather a person dealt with it.

Should there be a mandatory IQ testing before using E-Passport gates?

No

The instructions are not that clear.

How do they work anyhow?

No there should be a mandatory prove machine works before ripping government off for millions for total junk. Im guessing the software for those machine was written by the guy that wrote the software that always has an unexpected item in bagging area.

Not to worry, soon we’ll have blue passports and will be waved through the gates with a cheery smile.

xora 🙂

@molgrips to the thread 😉

If you get sweaty thumb marks all over the biometric chip the machine fails. Don’t hold your passport open at the scanning page for long periods in hot weather. A ‘long period’ in this instance is greater than 15 seconds!
Oh and sunlight behind you also throws them, guess what happens on a sunny afternoon in Stansted?
It also helps if all machines are working all the time to keep the crowds moving, having 20% off-line at any one time is not a great advert.

I use them regularly: sometimes the facial recognition takes seconds, sometimes – like just this Wednesday – it takes a good few minutes! Much to the amusement of my colleagues.

I’m very shortsighted and must remove my glasses before the face check so then have no idea what it’s telling me to do. Poorly thought out system.

I don’t even know which **** side the bagging area is. Why not write bagging area on the actual bagging area?
Why not have a simple button that cancels the unexpected item and save everyone a lot of **** grief?
My theory is that all this techy crap is obviously thought up by geeks. All geeks were bullied and belittled at school.
The anger has welled up for many years and now they are taking their vengeance on society by making the most simple thing as difficult as possible.
Format a disc? That sounds harmless. Why not “erase-forever with no chance of getting your pictures back?”
****.

Shame they got rid of Iris, that was much faster…..

If you don’t like the self-service gates/tills, why not just join the queue with a human at the end?

Should there be a mandatory IQ testing before using E-Passport gates?

And self-checkouts. And self-serve petrol. And ticket machines. And voting 😉

I don’t even know which **** side the bagging area is. Why not write bagging area on the actual bagging area?

Hmm.. Let’s see, one side has your basket and the other side is where you bag stuff into your bags… y’know “bagging”! 🙂

Why not have a simple button that cancels the unexpected item and save everyone a lot of **** grief?

Great idea it could say “It looks like you are trying to steal something. Press here for me to quietly ignore it” 🙂

The sooner we are all chipped and bar coded,the better.
🙂

I have found that there is a huge difference in the reliability of the machines in different airports. Schipol seems to be ok some days, temperamental others. The machines in Brussels never seem to work correctly.

Mate and his wife using one last holiday, wife sails through. His took ages, he suspects he has a suspicious beard that needs lots of confirmation matching 🙂

The instructions are not that clear.

The instructions are perfectly clear on the ones I used.

How do they work anyhow?

IME, they don’t.
Frankfurt ones do (when they have them enabled).
UK ones that I’ve used don’t.
That’s with a UK passport with the chip symbol thingy that lets you use e-gates.

I always choose the e-passport thing, knowing fully well it will tell me to turn round and go to a manned booth. You get a fast track route to the manned booths 🙂

There should be a mandatory IQ test for security though. Segregate them scanners in to lanes for regular travellers, families, and the totally clueless, so that I don’t get held up by someone that needs 7 trays, and gets told off for finally admitting they do have a load of cosmetics and an iPad when they have explicitly mentioned 3 times that they don’t when asked.

Why don’t I use the cashier serve lane?
There often isn’t one in my supermarket.
Graham s how do I know which side is the basket side? Sometimes I don’t even have a basket. Are you a geek ?

the trick is to avoid the queue with any of the following

Old women
Old men
Those wearing glasses
Those wearing sleeveless t-shirts and having child name tattoo’s (men and women)
any combination of the above.

the pensioners never have their passport ready, they move their head up and down as their bi-focals mean they cant read the signs or see whats going on, they look left to right because they think nothing is happening, they look down and double check their passport by turning it around a few times.

then their son/daughter tries to walk into the space to try and assist… 😈

avoid these people and it can be a pleasant speedy experience.

The last ones we went through only had small writing that said “ok, now remove your passport and I’ll open the gate”.

Which is a fat load of good if you’ve had to remove your glasses and so can”t actually read said writing, so just stand there wondering why nothing’s happening. The big green lights only came on when the gate opens after you remove the passport.

Stupid design…

My brand new passport just wouldn’t scan in Manchester airport, my old one about 6 months ago worked after a few attempts.

The machines just arn’t very good, and I agree for a fist time user it’s not very apparent which way round your passport should be or what the procedure is.

And voting

A door with a handle on the polling booth instead of a curtain would probably do it 😉

Graham s how do I know which side is the basket side? Sometimes I don’t even have a basket.

It’s not chuffing rocket science is it??

I think you’re doing a pretty good job of supporting the general point of this thread 😀

Are you a geek ?

And proud. 🙂

But contrary to your theory, I wasn’t bullied.
(I was a Prop Forward for the school and the local rugby team)

My best time from opening plane doors to walking out and getting into the taxi was thirteen minutes – that was at Manchester with an E Passport which worked first go!

I am amazed at the remarks about it not being clear which way to put your passport!

It obviously has be the photopage placed on the scanner glass, how else would it work?

I’ve never had a problem getting it to work. Sometimes the recognition process takes a few seconds and occasionally over a minute.

There should be a mandatory IQ test for security though.

The worst ones are the people who think it’s OK repack their laptop and put their shoes and belt back on, at the rollers, holding everyone else up. 👿

My passport doesn’t work in most of them. Incidentally, don’t tell this to the passport control guy, they don’t like it.

gobuchul – Member

The worst ones are the people who think it’s OK repack their laptop and put their shoes and belt back on, at the rollers, holding everyone else up.

That’s a fault of the system not the user.

That’s a fault of the system not the user.

Not when there are loads of tables within a few feet.

It’s not difficult, put passport in slot, look at screen.

But if your like me, someone who foolishly had his passport photo taken without their glasses. Having to take my glasses of for the things to work I’m to blind to even look in the right direction 😳

…with no belt or shoes on and a load of stuff to carry while you hold your trousers up with one hand 😆 No ta. Why we tolerate this nonsense I don’t know, you wouldn’t go through a supermarket checkout then carry all your stuff over to a table on the other side of the room before you pack your bags. Airports seem to get an easy ride just because it’s security related but the embuggerment of it all isn’t security related at all, it’s poor or rather couldn’t-give-a-shit design. So don’t blame me when it holds you up.

tthew – Member

My passport doesn’t work with them. It did one time when they were first installed at Manchester, but I still go in the, (shorter) queue and let if fail. Then I get sent to the front of the massive queue for the manual gate. Crafty. One to have up your sleeve at CDG when the main line is 1000 deep, and the e-passport gates are only for French citizens.
The facial recognition software seems to accommodate significant variations of beard, which is quite impressive.

Iris was so much better – best for me was LHR T5 out of A380 from LAX and into car in short stay in <20mins

I would bet the people who get to the E-gates without passport out/with glasses on etc are the same ones who get to security without liquids in a bag and with pockets full of coins.

I use them regularly and usually get them wrong… My passport seems to be set-up the wrong way round compared to the diagrams – these show the gold front bit sticking out of the scanner. If i do this it won’t read as the info page on mine is at the front (yep, its a UK passport). Doesn’t help that most of the gold front bit has worn off the passport.

The US ones are clearer, I can get from plane to taxi in US airports in under 5 minutes. Takes me 15-20 minutes in Heathrow.

you wouldn’t go through a supermarket checkout then carry all your stuff over to a table on the other side of the room before you pack your bags.

Never shopped in Aldi then?

They’ve always worked well for me. Commuting weekly to Sweden was a breeze last year. Walk in, beep passport, walk across T2, get in car, drive off. 10 mins.

It’s a fancy scanner with a photo booth on top.

It wants to see the page of your passport with the photo on it, and look at your face – just like the miserable human at the end of the other queue. How hard can this be?

And they work with glasses on. If not, just look at the screen before taking them off!