V-Flyer

For those of you who want to speed up your return once you have arrived back at Gatwick, you may be interested in splashing out £12.50 per person to get priority passage through Border Controls:

Link

Now if they had something like that in Terminal 3 at Heathrow

buns

Is this really a novelty, if Gatwick Manned all the available desks that would help alleviate 90% of the problem.

I have arrived at Gatwick North to queues outside the customs hall to find only a handful of desks manned - its not as if they didn't know the planes were going to land at that time !

Just looks like another Gatwick cash cow to me.

markyl wrote:Is this really a novelty, if Gatwick Manned all the available desks that would help alleviate 90% of the problem.

I have arrived at Gatwick North to queues outside the customs hall to find only a handful of desks manned - its not as if they didn't know the planes were going to land at that time !

Just looks like another Gatwick cash cow to me.

Quite agree - if HM Border Force manned all the available desks then there would not be a problem. This leads me to suggest that a cut of the fee must be going to HM Border Force.

buns

markyl wrote:Is this really a novelty, if Gatwick Manned all the available desks that would help alleviate 90% of the problem.

I have arrived at Gatwick North to queues outside the customs hall to find only a handful of desks manned - its not as if they didn't know the planes were going to land at that time !

Just looks like another Gatwick cash cow to me.

The airport is NOT responsible for staffing the immigration / customs points that is down to the Border Force and the Home Office who control their (reducing) budget.

It's the same as LHR and all other ports of entry / exit to the country.

LGW will be getting very little (if any ) of the fee - it goes to Border Force to pay for the immigration staff which will be over and above the existing staff levels.

At LHR T3 and T5 where there is fast track for some passengers the service is paid for by the airlines and Border Force have the fee listed in some of their 'cost per service' documents. It's something like £3.50 per passenger though BA pay a fixed hourly amount at T5as it's only their passengers.

This is something I would actually pay for - but you would have to know your bags would also be waiting on the other side for it to be worth it.

Also, there is no indication of what happens if you have booked it for 8am on the basis of your plane landing at 8.10am for example, but the plane being two hours late? Do you lost the ability to use it?!

Donkeh wrote:This is something I would actually pay for - but you would have to know your bags would also be waiting on the other side for it to be worth it.

Also, there is no indication of what happens if you have booked it for 8am on the basis of your plane landing at 8.10am for example, but the plane being two hours late? Do you lost the ability to use it?!

I wondered the same but then realised earlier today you could book a slot for right there and then. I'd quite happily pay if it means avoiding a queue, but I've not flown into LGW South in a long time and I haven't been longer than 10 mins in T3 even with the eGates down.

Flying back from LAS in a couple of weeks so will try it out if it looks busy.

I would happily pay, but for the first time in a decade we are flying back via Heathrow on our next holiday.
Dick D

You need to book at least 24 hours in advance so cannot just decide to use on the day if it's busy

MoJoJo wrote:You need to book at least 24 hours in advance so cannot just decide to use on the day if it's busy

Good thing you said! Just read the T&Cs myself and clearly states 24 hours in advance. Naughty that you can go through the whole process for today's date.

So, next question, how busy is LGW South at 10am on a Tuesday morning?

I've always managed to arrive to empty e-gates when coming in on the VS64 however that could be down to luck on the day.