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RAT 5
11th Oct 2017, 07:01
I was flying from AMS to Italy i.e. a Schengen trip. Passport was checked at baggage drop off. There was no further passport/immigration control due to Schengen and we arrived at the boarding gate. Our boarding was done purely with a scanned boarding pass. There was no confirmation that my ID matched the boarding pass. I could have been anyone. I appreciate that Schengen is passport free travel, but from a security point of view I thought airlines were required to ensure that passengers travel with their luggage and are the same person as booked the flight. I could have gone into the Schengen area of the terminal and swapped boarding cards with someone and we could have boarded each other's flight with unknown baggage. From memory this is the first time this has happened, i.e. no passport check at the gate.
Is this now the EU rule? It does seem strange at a time when countries are thinking of tightening boarder controls. From a security point of view, if all hand baggage & hold baggage is screened and cleared for travel then, in theory, there is no security risk, but is it no longer the case that passengers have to travel with their own luggage when possible? I know about 'rush' luggage being approved. One would suspect that a passenger changing flights is suspicious and needs answering, but that can only be done with a check. Thus the only passport control is at baggage drop/check-in.

Bengt
11th Oct 2017, 07:17
This has been the case for my trips with KLM from Sweden to AMS. I was surprised as well the first time.

Harry Wayfarers
11th Oct 2017, 07:19
In the old days I would drive thru five different countries in one day, Luxembourg, Belgium, France, England and Wales and the only place I was ever asked for my passport was when entering my own damn country in Dover! ... I was never asked for ID to board the cross channel ferry so why should an aeroplane be any different?

I think the ID vs boarding pass name check was introduced by the LoCo's as an excuse for bumping you off or charging for a name change, basically your ticket, not that we have tickets any longer, is your life insurance and if it ain't your name on it then tough!

Hotel Tango
11th Oct 2017, 08:12
I remember the good old days when my business traveler dad gathered all his unused (full fare) sectors from several tickets and booked an BHX-DUS-CPH-AMS-BHX flight in his name for me to use!

FQTLSteve
11th Oct 2017, 08:32
I don't think this is unusual. I've flown many intra Schengen sectors without passport/ID card check at the gate. On a flight from STK to AGP last year with SAS I used my Lufthansa Miles & More membership card in a self-service check-in machine as the only identification. The machine printed by baggage tag which I then attached and sent it through an automatic check-in desk. At security used the same card in a machine which printed a document the size of a bus ticket to confirm my seat allocation on board and was the only thing I required to board. No photo ID, and a fully automated procedure.

RAT 5
11th Oct 2017, 21:49
I read the comments, but my query was why it has changed in the past couple of years? I know the Schengen rules, but my thought was about ensuring that passengers travelled with their own luggage and that the person boarding an a/c was the correct guy, from a security point of view. Thinking about Interpol and tracking people, it renders that unreliable in Schengen (at airports) because the checkin does not ensure that person boarded that flight, and there is no passport check at arrival. I know Schengen is about free travel, and only airports have an opportunity to check. I was just curious in this day an age that something like this would be relaxed. Does anyone have the inside facts on this, and is it now common at all Schengen airports? Surely it must be a collective policy.

irishlad06
12th Oct 2017, 00:39
It is standard now a days.

With British Airways you can fly domestically from anywhere in the U.K. or Ireland (CTA) without ID. This is not checked at the gate for boarding so technically you could buy a ticket and somebody else travel in name so long as you had no bags, or the person comes to the airport with you if they have bags, they check in travel and nobody would ever know.

Scary thought in today's world but then so are a lot of things in the aviation industry.

Daysleeper
12th Oct 2017, 07:53
but my thought was about ensuring that passengers travelled with their own luggage and that the person boarding an a/c was the correct guy, from a security point of view.

Surely the basis of that rule was the assumption that the security threat wanted to not be on the plane and thus survive. the people you are protecting against these days don’t care if they survive... that rule is pointless and 100% screening of luggage is done so who cares who is on a “domestic” flight.

edi_local
13th Oct 2017, 07:57
The bags are still screened to the same level regardless of what tag is on the handle though, so the risk is minimal, surely?

I went through AMS last week EDI-AMS-KBP. On the way out I had no extra screening between getting off the EDI flight and boarding my KBP flight. On the way back I was screened between the KBP and EDI flights, presumably because KBP is non EU, even though they adhere to the same standards as the EU.

Harry Wayfarers
13th Oct 2017, 08:08
In the old days routing BHX/DUS/KBP/DUS/BHX, 50 seater CRJ's all the way there and back, I don't recall any passport or ID checks in DUS, both flights arrived and departed from the same finger, both non Schengen, so I guess "what the hell"!

virginblue
13th Oct 2017, 11:14
Why would there be passport checks while you were in transit airside? You technically never entered Germany. Would you have tried to leave the terminal to landside, you would have been checked by the border police. As you were not trying to do that, it was up to UK border control to check you leaving the country of departure (which the UK does not do, contrary to many other countries) and the Ukraine to check you entering Ukraine.

canberra97
13th Oct 2017, 15:00
virginblue

A very good post and at last a more accurate one.

Fairdealfrank
13th Oct 2017, 16:00
Why would there be passport checks while you were in transit airside? You technically never entered Germany. Would you have tried to leave the terminal to landside, you would have been checked by the border police. As you were not trying to do that, it was up to UK border control to check you leaving the country of departure (which the UK does not do, contrary to many other countries) and the Ukraine to check you entering Ukraine.

The UK, Ireland, and just a handful of other countries, do not have border control checking the passports of departing pax as there is no point. It is a waste of everyone's time but most countries do it.

The main concern is to check pax entering a country and border control should have adequate staff to do the job. Queues are always long at border control in most countries because there aren't enough staff available most of the time, so why waste some of them on departing pax and make the queues in arrivals even longer?

Any country concerned about who is leaving can have carriers supply pax lists to their equivelants of the Home Office, or if they're after a specific person at a specific time, have the police at the gate or at security.

Harry Wayfarers
13th Oct 2017, 18:12
Why would there be passport checks while you were in transit airside? You technically never entered Germany. Would you have tried to leave the terminal to landside, you would have been checked by the border police. As you were not trying to do that, it was up to UK border control to check you leaving the country of departure (which the UK does not do, contrary to many other countries) and the Ukraine to check you entering Ukraine.

But I would regularly transit thru AMS, not entering The Netherlands, and regularly pass thru a passport check and/or security check, even once I had to go to the police office on the side because the Luxembourg police had put out an APB on me to the Dutch and Belgians under an old BENELUX arrangement.

RAT 5
13th Oct 2017, 19:27
The UK, Ireland, and just a handful of other countries, do not have border control checking the passports of departing pax as there is no point. It is a waste of everyone's time but most countries do it.

So the police put out an all points to border posts to search for Mr/Mrs XYZ. The check in person is not security. They check the passport at check-in, true. That could alert a flagged person, but does it? Is their system linked in? If not then a APB to airports in Schengen is useless. Further, if police wanted to track a suspect's moments across Schengen they could not. XYZ checks in for flight ABC, but in fact swaps boarding passes with an accomplice and travels to DEF and disappears. The police waiting at HIJ to intercept are left dumfounded. It does seem strange in a era when security seems to getting tighter.
I'm not a great supporter of Big Brother, but it seems uncoordinated when compared to some of the petty trivial security checks that are enforced.

Previously I have seen pax removed form the departure passport check (Schengen) as they had been flagged as not having paid certain fines, or alimony or tax etc. That is why departure checks were thought useful. However, I understand that it violates the principle of Schengen and as checks can not be enforced across all forms of travel, why bother with any?

Hotel Tango
13th Oct 2017, 22:36
Further, if police wanted to track a suspect's moments across Schengen they could not. XYZ checks in for flight ABC, but in fact swaps boarding passes with an accomplice and travels to DEF and disappears. The police waiting at HIJ to intercept are left dumfounded.

But these checks don't exist if you travel by road, train, or even by foot. Therefore I fail to understand why you feel they should be needed specifically for air travel?

Mister Geezer
13th Oct 2017, 23:29
In the UK I have seen on occasions, immigration officials situated after security and stopping people on request, so it is not unheard of if they are looking for anything in particular.

I have also seen in MAN and LHR that if you fly domestic, then a picture is taken of your face when you first scan your boarding pass prior to security and whilst you approach the gate, a second picture is taken when you next scan your boarding pass and a cross check to verify that the first and second image match.

Mr Oleo Strut
14th Oct 2017, 01:46
An interesting topic. I have been comparing recent aviation ID checks with other forms of international travel. On Brittany Ferries you show your passport to an official on departure and arrival, same with the train, which permits a visual ID check and passport scan if necessary. You could, in theory, swap passports after that point but would be in trouble on arrival because your passport picture and you would not match unless a substitution had taken place after check-in. Most people keep a firm grip on their passport or other ID which I think is the best protection against abuse. Having said that, though, I am aware that some people carry multiple passports. Would it matter if they showed different passports at check-in and arrival?

compton3bravo
14th Oct 2017, 06:01
A friend of mine recently got went through Charles de Gaulle and Madrid airports from Canada on a British passport and was directed to the non-EU desks at both airporrts. She ignored them and went to the EU desks, a sign of things to come maybe?

RAT 5
14th Oct 2017, 06:53
But these checks don't exist if you travel by road, train, or even by foot. Therefore I fail to understand why you feel they should be needed specifically for air travel?


Hence my last sentence. I was just curious that it had happened with little/no publication.

However, I understand that it violates the principle of Schengen and as checks can not be enforced across all forms of travel, why bother with any?

Heathrow Harry
14th Oct 2017, 20:21
because unfortuately air traffic attracts terrorists - buses don't

Harry Wayfarers
15th Oct 2017, 00:34
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Thalys_train_attack

Rutan16
15th Oct 2017, 02:05
Sorry Heathrow Harry but that’s so wrong remember 7/7,

Remember the troubles in Ireland Dublin Belfast rail line constant target.

Remember Madrid and Paris

In Israel buses have been bombed relentlessly for decades

Ground transport is at significant threat and risk and it’s a much softer target in the main.

Successful use of airliners as weponry have been exceptionally rare, caveat the those utterly abhorrent events in New York and Washington many years ago.

Criminal activity involving airliners have mainly been political hijacking and indeed many have been from the US to Cuba over the years .

Even hijacks have steadily declined because of the levels of security at the front of the house and the armoured door locked cockpits these days.

Heathrow Harry
15th Oct 2017, 07:14
Trains and buses have indeed been bombed but 99%of those were in country. Air travel has a much higher profile in the media. Just compare coverage of road accidents which kill hundreds and thousands with headlines such as "ryanair almost use all of runway to takeoff".

Air travel is still seen as special and dangerous........... Any terrorist knows that..... which is why they expend a lot of effort trying to get bombs on board.

Harry Wayfarers
15th Oct 2017, 07:32
Air travel is still seen as special

One only has to read around one or two or few notable threads in Airlines, Airports & Routes to recognise that air travel attracts some nutters!

P.S. How is Church Fenton doing by the way? :)

Rutan16
15th Oct 2017, 07:47
Indeed the media are primed by our spooks about aviation criminal threats however it’s almost certainly not the prime target to be honest.

The capacity of many groups simply isn’t at the levels of suffisication some journalists would have you believe imho.

Specifically in the case of ISIS where there pernicious methods and cell structures well not even cell structure often lone wolves seem to fail constantly (the British spooks are doing a grand job in degrading them from within btwJ

They haven’t even got the ability to produce an effective explosive device beyond a simple kettle bomb.

Those chemical liquids based bomb ideas are vapour and simply haven’t been demonstrated to work have they aside from one laptop attach in East Africa that killed the criminal and little damage.

All said some groups certainly get publicity via aviation threats even through they probably can’t deliver !

Imho those Islamic groups we all here about are technologically far behind what ETA and the IRA were able to achieve some decades ago however the real concern and risk from them is the total ramdoness of rather simple acts of violence using realily has available materials combined their own death cult !

Harry Wayfarers
15th Oct 2017, 07:55
Was it one of the Paris terro's or Brussels terro's than a probationary cop shot dead on a street in Italy where said terro had travelled to by train ... Presumably terrorism and terrorists have relocated to other modes of transportation because it is too difficult for them to travel by or terrorise airliners!

Rutan16
15th Oct 2017, 08:22
Indeed it’s probably the case that the criminally minded loons have moved the sights to softer targets .

I am loath to use the word terrorist in the case of the corrosive so called Islamic murderers.

It gives them some policitical creadance they don’t deserve.

That isn’t to say their acts don’t put fear into the community though.

Heathrow Harry
16th Oct 2017, 08:22
"P.S. How is Church Fenton doing by the way?

don't understand the reference .............................

RAT 5
18th Oct 2017, 07:20
The question was prompted by a flight from AMS - Italy. No passport check at the gate. From Italy the gate lady made a very thorough check of boarding card v passport before she scanned it. If this is an EU-wide law I understand that Schengen countries can always impose stricter rules should they wish. Could it be that it was because Italy is a Schengen area outer border country? Or Italy has not been notified?

Heathrow Harry
18th Oct 2017, 07:54
probably because she fancied you?

RAT 5
18th Oct 2017, 19:06
Wasn't only me; and if she did she'd be very desperate. I would have been the winner on the deal.

Bjarte
18th Oct 2017, 19:40
Pretty funny this discussion for me as Schengen resident. Funny because I'm surprised if I NEED to show a passport at the gate. That almost never happens to me, except for Ryanair flights. Moreover, I do not see the need to show a passport since it is in fact a domestic flight.

RAT 5
18th Oct 2017, 19:51
Bjarte: I can agree. All I was discussing is that it changed in the last 12 months. Schengen has been around for years. And yet we hear that Europe is at a heightened level of security vigilance at the same time as they remove a possible tracking system of wanted individuals. On the one hand I applaud the ease of movement, on the other I wonder if the left & right hands are connected in the security world.

JollyTraveller
18th Oct 2017, 20:23
Schiphol is a great airport to use.

I understand the point people are making about passport checks but everybody should have their passport checked to enter that area of the terminal and all should get passports checked when they enter new area outside of the Schengen area. i.e. UK boarder, US boarder etc.

Bjarte
18th Oct 2017, 20:55
I don't think it changed in the last 12 months, no checks has been the standard for years. The only change is that gate agents at Schiphol need to check passports for flights to France, because of the emergency regulation in France.

ExSp33db1rd
19th Oct 2017, 02:19
But these checks don't exist if you travel by road, train, or even by foot. Therefore I fail to understand why you feel they should be needed specifically for air travel?

Because you may not be the person boarding who checked the bag, and had passport / name noted, nothing to do with border crossings, only an attempt to thwart bombs in suitcase nutters who then don't fly.

Not sure if the previous comments about all bags been screened to the same level is relevant in Europe, I've only ever had a note left in my bag to advise that it has been opened leaving the USA, no European agency has ever bothered to check the same sort of contents that I routinely carry and seem to annoy the TSA.

Harry Wayfarers
19th Oct 2017, 02:29
But these nutters can place their bags on buses, coaches and trains without travelling!

RAT 5
31st Oct 2017, 19:28
Just had cause to fly between MAN & AMS. Remember my opening post; but that was between 2 Schengen countries, this was not. From AMS they did not use 'boarding card only automatic gate' check: it was a ground staff passport check & scan of boarding card. Entering UK it was a Border Agency passport scan on arrival, manual or automatic.
Departing UK the only check was a boarding pass scan to enter security and then into AMS was an immigration passport check, manual or automatic.
Thus it seems the only passport check is on arrival not departure, even between non-Schengen countries; so how can the movement of 'wanted' people be tracked if there is no departure check? I know guys have said in the previous posts that other transport systems don't check, but that is only inside Schengen; this was at the outside borders. It would suggest that Schengen is interested only in entry and not departure. Curious.
I'm not a big brother bloke, quite the opposite, but it seems inconsistent with what governments are saying on the security front.

ExXB
31st Oct 2017, 19:50
Are you sure you didn't go through passport control departing AMS? With a non-schengen destination that doesn't sound likely. All departures from CH to non-schengen countries have passport control before the gate.

I don't think the UK has had passport control on departure for some decades (regardless of destination). Only the airline, and perhaps security (but I don't think so), would check your ID for a flight departing the UK.

Harry Wayfarers
31st Oct 2017, 21:31
I know guys have said in the previous posts that other transport systems don't check, but that is only inside Schengen

No it isn't, it is not pertinent to Schengen, it is the open borders policy of the EU, on your passport it is printed 'EUROPEAN UNION' so why should you need to show your passport to enter any country of the EU?

I think what confuses the issue is the 'island mentality' of UK.

RAT 5
31st Oct 2017, 23:58
ExxB: Apologies. You are correct; I did go through passport on departure AMS, but not departure UK.

zed3
1st Nov 2017, 08:29
RAT 5... I'm sure that when boarding the a/c in the UK you had to produce a passport (open at the info page) and boarding card for the gate agent. Whilst this is not technically a passport control, I would assume that a departure list goes to Border Control. We flew on KLM LBA to Schiphol twice last month and that was the procedure... also on the return from Schiphol.