Constant passport checks

[pilotchute]

Hello,

Can someone please explain to me the constant need to have passports and boarding passes checked by people who are sometimes not even 50 feet away from each other?

I recently went through Kuala Lumpur and had to go through security to get into the transit lounge. Really? I just got off a plane? I then had passport and boarding pass checked again by staff for reasons unknown. I had only just showed them to security maybe 2 mins previously. Leaving the departure lounge to head off to the gate and checked again! Went to my departure lounge and had to show passport and boarding pass again just to line up for the security check to enter the lounge. Then security wanted to see all documents again. Then when we boarded the wanted it all again.

My god how many times do they need to check!!

[lomapaseo]

My god how many times do they need to check!!

depends on how many holes in the walls they have to escape these checks.

[Basil]

My guess? Every time there's a screw-up, they add another check. All arse-covering :hmm:

[Planemike]

Good for job creation............

[farci]

Can someone please explain to me the constant need to have passports and boarding passes checked by people who are sometimes not even 50 feet away from each other?

At the risk of starting an avalanche I can beat 50 feet! At Orly Sud security only 10ft (3m) between boarding card checks...

[Stanwell]

.
Same here... Exasperating is just one word that comes to mind.

I sometimes wonder how much they pay to the man who got them a job with a uniform provided.

[Heathrow Harry]

or at T5 - someone checks your passport and the next person checks your boarding card 2m behind them - no wonder BA struggles to make money

[pilotchute]

I also like how some airports want you to check your luggage then take it to the screening point and others require you get it x rayed first. They roll their eyes at you if get it wrong like your an idiot.

Some want shoes off and others want shoes on. Laptops out or laptops in the bag? I give up!

[ExXB]

Apparently inconsistency is intentional. Keeps the Blackhats guessing*

*and if you believe this works! I have a bridge in New York that I'm looking to sell ...

I suppose nobody will be able to travel without valid documents.*

* see above

[Agaricus bisporus]

Last time I flew from Luton the first and only passport "check" was at the boarding gate.

[pilotchute]

Travel within the EU doesn't count!

[Captivep]

Heathrow Harry - that's not quite how it happens.


The first person (security) checks that you're the same person who was given that boarding pass.


The second person (BA) is doing the normal boarding procedure.

[localflighteast]

Flying YTZ to Reagan.
Passport/ boarding card checked no less than 11 times.

OH still holds the record at 12.

Most of these checks by airport security staff not CBSA CATSA or TSA.

OH refused at one point to see what they'd do.

Answer was : stand there with mouth open while police officers looked on laughing.

Guess they don't like amateurs either!

[McGoonagall]

At Schiphol last week it was checked at the bag drop and gate. Hand luggage and it would have been gate only. However, boarding card was shown a few times including buying a box of chocolates. :confused:

[ExXB]

Travel within the EU doesn't count!

Er, Travel within the Schengen area doesn't count! That excludes Ireland/UK but includes Iceland, Norway and Switzerland.

[AdamFrisch]

There is a direct correlation between a countries democracy and the amount of passport checks. Less democracy = more checks.

Funnily enough, you find the same correlation in regards to armed military men with machine guns. The more of those you see in an airport, the less likely you are to be in a democracy.

The one that took the cake for me, was when I was boarding a Turkish Airline flight in Istanbul. After about 6754 passport checks at every point, I couldn't help but laugh when halfway down the jetway (in the fu*king jetway, people) we got stopped and another "important person with stern Cheka face" wanted to check the passport. That's when I knew Turkey wasn't really ready for EU membership.

Democracy, my a*se.

[Heathrow Harry]

"Heathrow Harry - that's not quite how it happens.

The first person (security) checks that you're the same person who was given that boarding pass.

The second person (BA) is doing the normal boarding procedure."

How difficult would it be for one person to do both?????

[flash8]

In Almaty (Kazakhstan) with Boss and Bosses boss.... ummm...

They passed control with a wave of the hand and a smile (or perhaps I am imagining that bit) .. muggings here stopped due I suspect to a dodgy looking British Passport... was falling apart.

TU-154 on the tarmac burning fuel waiting for me... crew not happy, boss not happy, bosses boss very unhappy, passengers most unhappy.

First question the Kazakh officer asked me when eventually came to the office I were held in after 20 minutes... "Do you speak English Mr Flash???"..... wtf *%^.. after calming down I managed to persuade her to let me go....

Boarding TU-154... thank god in Business.... would have hated walking down the aisles "Walk of Shame".

But not end of Story.

At Moscow (home for me) I managed to get a second British passport (available to those who travel a lot to dodgy Countries) so was now holding two.

Next time at Kazakh Passport control.... same Lady... (there IS a god!).. so I brazened up and whipped BOTH passports out.

The look on her face was PRICELESS.

[PhilJG]

A couple of weeks ago in Accra:

1. At a desk BEFORE the check in counter, involving a fair bit of computer keyboard work
2. At the checkin counter
3. By a guy sitting on a stool at the entrance to the immigration hall who also checked the yellow fever vaccination record book
4. BY a military uniformed guy who then directed you to an immigration desk
5. The immigration desk
6. The person letting you into the Alkira Lounge
7. A guy standing at the beginning of the walk down to the gates
8. The boarding pass scan
9. At a desk in front of the gate lounge (involving computer use again, slow)

No more after that!

[PAXboy]

With ref to parts of the world where jobs are in even shorter supply than in the West - some here may remember that Flanders & Swan had a phrase for it:

"It all makes work for the workingman to do"

But seriously - jobs are important there and it's why you won't see so much automated road machinery, rather, large gangs of men doing it by hand.

[PC767]

At T2 and T5 LHR, international and domestic passengers are housed together in the same departure area. Domestic passengers have a photo taken at the entry point to security.

The first check upon boarding is LHR security who check you are the person on the stored photograph. I have entered security in uniform and changed to civies in the lounge which had caused endless fun at that boarding photo check.

The second check is the regular airline boarding process, registering that you are onboard, and on the correct flight etc.

Having said all that, the most recent time I flew Aer Lingus from T2, the Aer Lingus gate staff, (Menzies?), completed both checks at the same desk which seemed much less complex.

[fyrefli]

I think the thing that annoys me the most is seeing non-regular SLF being shouted at for presenting passport with boarding pass "bookmarked" therein when only the boarding pass is required. Regulars generally know which bit is required when but it's only natural for people to carry them together. Just take the pass out and scan it for heaven's sake. Takes less time than the shouting method. I've seen this happen at three or four UK airports.

[Heathrow Harry]

Shouting is the only fun some people get

[WHBM]

I think the thing that annoys me the most is seeing non-regular SLF being shouted at for presenting passport with boarding pass "bookmarked" therein when only the boarding pass is required. Regulars generally know which bit is required when but it's only natural for people to carry them together. Just take the pass out and scan it for heaven's sake. Takes less time than the shouting method. I've seen this happen at three or four UK airports.
Well I'm a "regular" and I still get shouted at because procedures differ between stations. One trip a while ago from London to Dublin, one was requiring laptops out of bags and the other wasn't (I forget which way round), On the outward I got reprimanded for not having my laptop out all ready (despite there being nowhere on the approach to do this) and wasting the queue's time, and on the return same day I was taking it out and was reprimanded because I was doing so and I shouldn't and I was wasting the queue's time :rolleyes:

Likewise presenting the BP to the cabin crew, or not, is varied between must/must not/don't care dependent on a combination of station, carrier, and state of registration requirements.

The worst I witnessed, and sorry to mention names, was the handling agent of Ryanair at Stansted whose mumbled boarding announcement included "passport open at the photo page". The young, fit (although pimply), twenty-something agent proceeded to give a loud and sarcastic reprimand to the elderly, seventy-something, arthritic old lady who had haltingly presented her passport without quite thumbing it open. It quite upset her.

[WHBM]

At Schiphol last week it was checked at the bag drop and gate. Hand luggage and it would have been gate only. However, boarding card was shown a few times including buying a box of chocolates.
I used to imagine the showing of BP airside for buying everything was unnecessary as well until I discovered it's nothing to do with security, but is enforced as part of the commercial side's sales analysis of which destinations/ticket class buy which products.

It really is poor that this commercial inconvenience (if you have your BP at the bottom of your bag, or if they are all held by your companion who is elsewhere) is allowed to be masked as a security matter.

[PAXboy]

The marketing people have it so sewn up (and the pax so dragooned) that, in the shops, if you refuse to show your boardcard - they won't sell you the goods. :*

[Heathrow Harry]

they tried that on a young Swedish guy at T5 earlier this summer - he then insisted on emptying his enormous carry on and diligently searching for the boarding pass - as the queue built up and people started to put their shopping baskets on the floor and leave the checkout girl asked the guy behind him to "lend" her his BP so she could get rid of the Swede & we could all shop in comfort............................

[PAXboy]

What a clever Swede, nice trick. :ok:

[GEB74]

I think India deserves a mention on this thread.:E
My record is THREE passport / booking confirmation checks BEFORE i even got to the check in desk....
I know they've got a growing population that needs employment, but really!!

[BARKINGMAD]

It is possible that the "Stasis various" about whom you complain spent the first hours of their training watching all the episodes of "Come Fly With Me", as prime examples of their passenger-handling techniques............................:rolleyes:

[Capot]

The marketing people have it so sewn up (and the pax so dragooned) that, in the shops, if you refuse to show your boardcard - they won't sell you the goods. I always say that my wife's got the card for safekeeping (often true if we're travelling together) and ask them to wait while I go find her, get the card and come back to the till. Works every time; the "security" need evaporates.

I don't know why I do this; it's easy to show the card. I suppose it's part of my daily fightback against being told lies and/or asked to do things that are totally unnecessary.

And, of course, I am a curmudgeonly, disagreeable old sod when i want or need to be. It's an age thing, and freedom to do it is one of the few pleasures of getting older.

[GrahamO]

Riyadh flight to Doha

Once before check in
Once at check in
Again at immigration
Once before getting to the airbridge
Once on the airbridge

The only one that was unusual was the 'on airbridge' one as that was done by a steward from the aircraft - almost as if they thought the Saudis were trying to send them undesirables.