Dover Ferries : Long Delays

Cardiffdaffs said:
Its not dead. They cant recruit enough staff to do the heavy lifting and low paid jobs which is creating pressure on existing staff who are struggling to cope.
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Yep.....not a business model that is sustainable.Once companies fold prices will go up.
 
Cardiffdaffs said:
Its not dead. They cant recruit enough staff to do the heavy lifting and low paid jobs which is creating pressure on existing staff who are struggling to cope.
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I mentioned on another thread about a family friend who was paid off from his cabin crew job during lockdown and found a steady job in a estate agent’s. He was asked to go back on less wages than he was previously on. Why would you.
 
My son and his partner joined up with us here in France yesterday and travelled by Eurostar from London.

He said the set up in St Pancras was excellent and the only queues at passport control was from people who weren’t organised. He said that the two of them just moved to a booth that wasn’t busy and got through in no time at all with no hassle. He even said that the French passport guy was joking with them whilst going through.

Busy times might be different but at 06.30 and not being the first day of the school holiday’s, no problem.
 
Drove to Spain (San Sebastian) for a day out from our base in France. If you haven’t been, this place is well worth a visit and I am sure I’ve put a stone on with all the pintxos.

Anyway, to my point. We all took our passports to cross into Spain and we weren’t required to show them. We did have to pay a crossing charge but that was the same before we left Europe.

Not sure if that is the same on every European border.
 
Norman_Conquest said:
Drove to Spain (San Sebastian) for a day out from our base in France. If you haven’t been, this place is well worth a visit and I am sure I’ve put a stone on with all the pintxos.

Anyway, to my point. We all took our passports to cross into Spain and we weren’t required to show them. We did have to pay a crossing charge but that was the same before we left Europe.

Not sure if that is the same on every European border.
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That's because France and Spain are in the Schengen area, once you are in this, there are no more checks at the border.
I work in Norway, and enter the Schengen area at Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands, after that I do not get checked when entering Norway 👍
 
Norman_Conquest said:
Drove to Spain (San Sebastian) for a day out from our base in France. If you haven’t been, this place is well worth a visit and I am sure I’ve put a stone on with all the pintxos.

Anyway, to my point. We all took our passports to cross into Spain and we weren’t required to show them. We did have to pay a crossing charge but that was the same before we left Europe.

Not sure if that is the same on every European border.
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We travelled from Spain to France for a rugby game and were told to take out passports just in case the police stopped us but i forgot. We weren't stopped and crossed with no bother.

I believe it doesn't matter where you go in the EU (on land boarders where there is no checks) it's just when you enter and leave they need to know so they can clock you in and out for your 90 days.
 
40FootRoad said:
That's because France and Spain are in the Schengen area, once you are in this, there are no more checks at the border.
I work in Norway, and enter the Schengen area at Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands, after that I do not get checked when entering Norway 👍
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Schengen. That sounds like a good idea - less red tape, less queuing, less hassle. I'd imagine goods flow easily over the borders too! Sounds like something the UK should get involved in! Might solve some of the Brexit problems!!
 
MolteniArcore said:
Schengen. That sounds like a good idea - less red tape, less queuing, less hassle. I'd imagine goods flow easily over the borders too! Sounds like something the UK should get involved in! Might solve some of the Brexit problems!!
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I would love us to join Schengen. it would be a great move. However, no political party can do it. The problem we have with the Brexit bigots holding the country to ransom, one of the main drivers for these small minded, nasty people is to restrict everyone freedom of movement. In the world of the Brexiter, freedom of movement is a bad thing, not a good thing.
 
40FootRoad said:
That's because France and Spain are in the Schengen area, once you are in this, there are no more checks at the border.
I work in Norway, and enter the Schengen area at Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands, after that I do not get checked when entering Norway 👍
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Without going through this thread to find the post, someone did post that they had to show their passports at different borders they had crossed into.
 
Lefty said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1558850242002489347
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I guess people will have differring experiences, but I can't see why additional border checks at your destination make any difference on scheduled flights. My sister and I went to Verona last week, from Gatwick. No problems going through passport control at gatwick and the stamping of passports added about 10 minutes at Verona border control. They had 3 gates open and processed the entire flight in about 20-30 minutes.

Coming back was a 40 minute delay due to being busy.

I did read yesterday that at Dover for lorries the median delay is 43 hours. I have no idea what it was pre-brexit, but not that I would imagine. For cars its about 4 hours median wait time.
 
The problem at Dover looked to be the infrastructure. The passport channels we're all open but the system couldn't cope with the amount of traffic approaching them.

Getting a family to produce passports from a car will take longer than it will for those standing at a desk in an airport. They'll have been in a confined space for hours with kids moving things about etc.

The problem at airports in this country has been more about security check queues, with multiple lanes closed due to staff being made redundant and poor wages and national security checks slowing down recruitment.
 
Corcaigh_the_Cat said:
The problem at Dover looked to be the infrastructure. The passport channels we're all open but the system couldn't cope with the amount of traffic approaching them.

Getting a family to produce passports from a car will take longer than it will for those standing at a desk in an airport. They'll have been in a confined space for hours with kids moving things about etc.

The problem at airports in this country has been more about security check queues, with multiple lanes closed due to staff being made redundant and poor wages and national security checks slowing down recruitment.
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Yup there is that and the mam and dad argument when they can't find them and whose fault it was that they are still on the kitchen table, before finding them in the carrier bag with drinks and crisps.
 
Lefty said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1558850242002489347
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Flew to Barcelona and back last week .
Not bad going out from Manchester apart from over fussy security .
Did twilight bag drop the night before , which was good .
Barcelona was a breeze , going in and coming out , even with stamping the passports .
Back to Manchester there was a mile long snake to self scan passports .
Is this necessary , when your passport is checked and stamped when leaving Spain ?
 
If there are 180 passengers on a flight and it takes 30 seconds to check each passport for identity and stamps to work out if less than 90 days spent in EU out of the last 180, that is an extra 90 minutes.

At Dover though, for freight vehicles, it is taking 10-20 minutes for checks on paperwork and a lot of it is wrong. most ferries can hold 180 lorries and vans, so that is an extra 30-60 HOURS, to perform checks.

No wonder many ferries have been leaving only half full.
 
Caretaker1 said:
Flew to Barcelona and back last week .
Not bad going out from Manchester apart from over fussy security .
Did twilight bag drop the night before , which was good .
Barcelona was a breeze , going in and coming out , even with stamping the passports .
Back to Manchester there was a mile long snake to self scan passports .
Is this necessary , when your passport is checked and stamped when leaving Spain ?
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Twilight bag drop????? Do all airports do this? Super idea.
 
Lefty said:
If there are 180 passengers on a flight and it takes 30 seconds to check each passport for identity and stamps to work out if less than 90 days spent in EU out of the last 180, that is an extra 90 minutes.

At Dover though, for freight vehicles, it is taking 10-20 minutes for checks on paperwork and a lot of it is wrong. most ferries can hold 180 lorries and vans, so that is an extra 30-60 HOURS, to perform checks.

No wonder many ferries have been leaving only half full.
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Lefty it may take 30 seconds for the passport stamp at some border controls. At verona it added about 10 seconds and in some cases less when there were very few stamps. I accept that may get worse as we get more stamps and they have to find an empty page. I was at the gate for less than 20 seconds in total. I did notice he did bother to look at my face and compare the passport which was a new experience flying into the EU.
 
Caretaker1 said:
Flew to Barcelona and back last week .
Not bad going out from Manchester apart from over fussy security .
Did twilight bag drop the night before , which was good .
Barcelona was a breeze , going in and coming out , even with stamping the passports .
Back to Manchester there was a mile long snake to self scan passports .
Is this necessary , when your passport is checked and stamped when leaving Spain ?
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Well the reason is that not all the passengers on your flight necessarily went through Spanish passport control. They may well have transited from anywhere.
 
Laughing said:
Lefty it may take 30 seconds for the passport stamp at some border controls. At verona it added about 10 seconds and in some cases less when there were very few stamps. I accept that may get worse as we get more stamps and they have to find an empty page. I was at the gate for less than 20 seconds in total. I did notice he did bother to look at my face and compare the passport which was a new experience flying into the EU.
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Yes, it could be less than 30 seconds, I was calculating at the upper end to see what the max disruption could be and as more technical solutions creep in that will come down anyway. On the other hand, the problem for the airlines is staff shortages exacerbated by Brexit and covid. I can see people actually taking longer to queue on passenger flights sometimes, but it shouldn't mean it's not doable and flights therefore won't get delayed.

Totally different kettle of fish for freight. The maths lines up with what we are seeing happening, doesn't it?
 
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