Flew to Mallorca yesterday from Manchester, and was fearing the worst after seeing some of the reports. Tried to get Fast Track tickets but all week it said none were available, then on Friday night luckily managed to get some. Turned up at the airport three hours early for the flight and even though things were a bit chaotic got through bag drop and security in about 45 mins, which was good. Fast track definitely made a difference so would recommend if you can get them. It’s a scam really, but I’d rather spend a fiver not to be stood in a queue for a few hours. As it turned out our flight ended up being delayed for a few hours anyway (not due to Manchester Airport) but at least it meant I got to watch the City game.
This is from Christian Machowski, a German living in Malaga who works for Euro Sports & Event Management getting top football teams to games and back so he knows airports.
But as I said on Thursday, my experience last week flying to and from Malaga was absolutely fine, because we check in on-line and only take hand luggage.
Unfortunately, that tends to be be peak time for departures.Interesting to read that about the fast track. I'd tried to get some for our flight out next week but it said there were non available. I'd assumed that was that and they were sold out. Didn't realise more could be released so I'll keep trying.
About the only hope I have is that we're on a relatively early flight (7am) so hoping we'll be through before the backlog really builds up as the day goes on.
My dads brother worked there as a bag chucker in the 70's/80's. He was on a pretty sweet deal (until he died of a heart attack in 85). My dad also worked at the airport, but he was in freight forwarding at the cargo centre. The whole place started going downhill from about the mid 90's.The demise of MAN goes as far back as the mid 90s and the privatisation of the baggage services and the so called removal of a monopoly that MIA held. Prior to this all airport authority positions were filled by Council workers, a lot of them ex-binmen who transferred after the refuse collection was sold off. Employment was sought after and cherished, and any staff found to be "crossing the line" were sent to Coventry. However a European ruling in relation to the baggage services monopoly and the Council`s desire to offload the responsibility of the local authority pension scheme opened up the market, meaning standards and working conditions dropped. Whilst the airlines were happy with this due to incurring lower costs multiple agencies fought for contracts and had to reduce their costs by employing cheaper labour. The airport then saw this as an opportunity to become a "Landlord" and no longer a major employer. They are only interested in taking as much money as possible from all and sundry with no responsibilities.
Post Covid they are suffering just like other sectors. They`ve lost staff who`ve now found gainful employment elsewhere. I`ve seen it mentioned that the UK has lost 1 million people from the employment market since the start of Covid. It`s now an employee`s market out there where you can pick and choose your employment. The fact that some supermarkets have upped their salary rates goes to show.
So you can get a job at MAN, get to a staff car park at 4am, then get a bus to the terminal, get run ragged for a shift in summer and return home via a bus and car. Or you can work for Sainsbury`s for more money and less hassle.
Manchester Airport`s problem this summer won`t just be recruitment, it`ll be staff retention.
I'm going there on the 26th. Have booked in online last week and paid for priority boarding etc. Hope it improves over the next couple of weeksFlying out of T2 with Jet2 on the 28th for a few days in Fuengirola with some mates. Does anyone know if there are similar issues at T2 or is it mainly T1?
I flew last year in the summer , easyJet to Newquay from T1, just as things were getting a bit busier.They could put a temporary ban on hand luggage to help the situation at security. Or if they allow one bag, just the person with the bag goes through that part and the other members go through a no bag screening system which might free up some space at least.
Yep. There has to be solutions. They are just not thinking hard enough.I flew last year in the summer , easyJet to Newquay from T1, just as things were getting a bit busier.
I had no hold or hand luggage, so security should have been a breeze, but it was slow even then.
as far as I could see, the issue was hand luggage that was scanned and was found to contain something dubious - eg liquids etc. Presumably because people hadn’t flown for a year and had forgotten about liquid limits and the ability to read the numerous signs…
the issue was then compounded by the dubious trays being pushed into the ‘manual checking’ conveyor belt, but because there were so many of them, that conveyor belt was full, which then meant that no more dubious trays could be pushed onto it, so ALL trays were halted due to that log jam. Which then meant that no body was passing through the scanners and the queue increased Rapidly and exponentially.
so, the issue could be said to be lack of staff manually checking dubious trays, but there is only so much physical space in T1 security, so they can’t overload the manual checking area, nor increase the length of the dubious tray conveyor, nor the holding area for passengers with dubious trays.
how to fix… well, adding no luggage passengers to the fast track would be an idea, just to ensure ‘easy’ throughput is maintained - but that is a very very small amount of people.
Maybe…sending trays through, and only if non dubious, allowing the person to be scanned, might be an option. Any dubious trays are marked and brought back around the scanner and offered to the passenger to sort out their stuff correctly… if it goes through again with issues, they join the very slow queue of manual checks.
longterm - cut down the size of duty free area and lengthen security so there’s space to stack dubious trays and their related passengers, to be dealt with.
Indeed. Think this was a personal trip as he went to see Stockport at Wrexham.if he knew so much about getting football teams to games he will know that teams don't go anywhere near security/terminals that normal people use.