Malaga Airport - passport control on departure

NoodleDoodleMan

Last year, same Sunday as yesterday, we had a stressful nightmare experience queuing over an hour in the passport queue for departures - no management or supervision of passengers - only just made the final call for our flight, as did many punters with other airlines.

We had spent 10 minutes in duty free, totally unaware of what was about to follow, otherwise we would have headed direct to the queue after security.

Yesterday was much better, only about 15 minutes as the line was moving forward at a steady pace, guided by airport staff.

Luggage checkin had been quicker, around 10 minutes, however I reckon that was because there wasn't a big queue for our GLA flight at that point - other UK queues looked much like a longer build up of passengers.

Security was also around 10 minutes - looks like they've moved a significant part of the inspection units since last year to relieve pressure elsewhere, certainly a welcome development.

Anyway - to the point - duty free is now also available past passport control so I would recommend bodyswerving the main shops and DF and heading straight to passport control queue.

There is a lesser choice of the ranges at duty free after that, however the popular brands of liquor etc. are on sale.

la531983

The problem with these Schengen areas is a lot of people will leave it as late as possible to proceed through the passport control area.  It works much better at airports where you are chucked through the passport control more or less immediately after security (such as in Vienna as an example). 

NoodleDoodleMan

Indeed.

After our dreadful experience a year ago we now head direct to passport control at Malaga immediately after security. That would be my advice to other UK passport holders.

To be fair, it seems the senior management at AGP have gotten their act together on this scenario since last year.

I read somewhere that the mayor of Malaga had become involved - maybe he exerted some influence?

Grumpy_chap

The delays may not all be down to Malaga or even Spanish organisations to resolve.  We've experienced similar at other airports within EU.  It seems to be a management decision - even though we have e-gates which record entry and exit, there is still a requirement for the passport to be manually stamped on entry and exit.

The situation at Malaga is, perhaps, compounded because the concessions and lounges are land-side and once through passport control, there is very little other than some seats.  Contrast that with Heathrow where you pass through security and passport control first and then have all the retail, refreshment, lounges aplenty to while away your time until the flight is called.

zagfles

Grumpy_chap said:

The delays may not all be down to Malaga or even Spanish organisations to resolve.  We've experienced similar at other airports within EU.  It seems to be a management decision - even though we have e-gates which record entry and exit, there is still a requirement for the passport to be manually stamped on entry and exit.

The situation at Malaga is, perhaps, compounded because the concessions and lounges are land-side and once through passport control, there is very little other than some seats.  Contrast that with Heathrow where you pass through security and passport control first and then have all the retail, refreshment, lounges aplenty to while away your time until the flight is called.

Not sure what you mean by that, the UK doesn't have passport exit checks so you don't go through passport control when leaving the UK.

Schengen does have exit checks, but quite often there's not a lot beyond the passport control area as most flights will be internal Schengen flights for which you don't need to go through passport control. So it makes sense for the main retail section etc to be in the Schengen area before passport control so everyone can use it not just people travelling outside Schengen.

What happens in some airports is the gate for the flight is announced quite late and it's only then that people realise that they need to go through passport control as the route to their gate is though passport control. So this causes big queues and can cause delays and even missing flights if the queues are really long.

So to play it safe if you're flying to the UK from Schengen, work out the non-Schengen gate area (eg look for an earlier flight to the UK or non Schengen country which has the gate displayed) and go towards that gate, and that'll take you through passport control before the hordes that arrive when your own gate is announced. 

la531983

zagfles said:

So to play it safe if you're flying to the UK from Schengen, work out the Schengen gate area (eg look for an earlier flight to the UK or non Schengen country which has the gate displayed) and go towards that gate, and that'll take you through passport control before the hordes that arrive when your own gate is announced. 

Plenty of airports will tell you the first part of the gate number straight away (in Gran Canaria the non-Schengen area gates all start D, for example, and it says this on the screens minus the number until about an hour beforehand)

Doshwaster

Problems with non-Schengen gates Malaga have been mentioned several times on MSE and I would agree that it is one of the worst I've experienced in Europe.

The last time I was there was in January when they were in the middle of installing automated scanners at passport control. Don't know if they are operational yet but they should help.

zagfles

Doshwaster said:

Problems with non-Schengen gates Malaga have been mentioned several times on MSE and I would agree that it is one of the worst I've experienced in Europe.

The last time I was there was in January when they were in the middle of installing automated scanners at passport control. Don't know if they are operational yet but they should help.

That'll be for the much delayed EES when the EU eventually get it working, which will replace passport stamping. 

We went through Malaga in March and there were no long queues/delays. 

NoodleDoodleMan

The scanners weren't operational for UK passport holders departing on flights this past Sunday.

It remains to be seen if they will improve the entry/exit process, or not - theory and practice are not always the same !!!

The exiting queue last weekend was acceptable, it kept moving at a steady pace and there were no "wiseguys" cutting in ahead due to staff supervision which was not the case last May..... that caused a lot of angst.

As said above, having the shops and duty free before the passport control line contributes to likely delays.

Doshwaster

NoodleDoodleMan said:

The scanners weren't operational for UK passport holders departing on flights this past Sunday.

It remains to be seen if they will improve the entry/exit process, or not - theory and practice are not always the same !!!

The exiting queue last weekend was acceptable, it kept moving at a steady pace and there were no "wiseguys" cutting in ahead due to staff supervision which was not the case last May..... that caused a lot of angst.

As said above, having the shops and duty free before the passport control line contributes to likely delays.

Tenerife South does have the automated scanners in operation now but only if you don't have children. If you are single or a couple travelling without kids then you can fly through entry and exit.

NoodleDoodleMan

Doshwaster said:

NoodleDoodleMan said:

The scanners weren't operational for UK passport holders departing on flights this past Sunday.

It remains to be seen if they will improve the entry/exit process, or not - theory and practice are not always the same !!!

The exiting queue last weekend was acceptable, it kept moving at a steady pace and there were no "wiseguys" cutting in ahead due to staff supervision which was not the case last May..... that caused a lot of angst.

As said above, having the shops and duty free before the passport control line contributes to likely delays.

Tenerife South does have the automated scanners in operation now but only if you don't have children. If you are single or a couple travelling without kids then you can fly through entry and exit.

Sounds good, thanks.

I believe TS and Malaga are the two busiest Spanish airports after Madrid and Barcelona ?