Bristol Airport

❎ Unverified | Just got back from collecting my elderly father from Bristol Airport - didn't fly personally, was just collecting him from there. Firstly, access roads leading to the airport from the South East are all appalling. Through the Mendips the roads are mostly narrow and often twisty, with no real signposts - there are no sign posts for the airport until you're a couple of miles away and it is very easy to get lost even with SatNav. Secondly, the 'collection' car park is overpriced and too far away from the arrivals area, it's almost as if it has deliberately been located as far away as possible. To get from one to the other you need to walk miles through mud, cross busy roads and ascend masses of steps (slippery in the rain). You can park for up to 20 minutes for £1, but as you can't even walk to the arrivals area in that time it's completely pointless them offering it, upto 1 hour is £3.50, and realistically, with a disabled elderly person you need longer - which is when the price really racks up. There is no handy place you can pull in and help a disabled person and their luggage into a vehicle without walking the full distance. Thirdly, the staff are aggressive, foul mouthed and unhelpful. Altogether, I would recommend flying via any other airport if at all possible.

✅ Verified Review | We (Grandparents, Daughter, husband and two grand children aged 2.5 years and 15 months) arrived at the airport on Friday 23rd June at 04.15 for a 06.20 flight, the check in and bag drop was pretty much standard, just about 15 minutes then we went on to security. This is is where the disaster started, the queues were horrendous, with no real progress forward being made. As the clock was ticking down we were getting concerned and mentioned that we had just about an hour to our departure to a member of staff and he said it would not be a problem. Eventually we were processed and one of the kiddies pushchairs and "trunkie" got selected for a more thorough search, by which time we were down to about 30 minutes. Despite our pleas to process these items so we could move on there was no concern at all from any of the staff we were asking. Eventually with 10 minutes to go to departure time we were cleared to move on. We then heard that our flight was closing at gate 14, we had no idea that gate 14 was about as far away as you can get from the security area. Bristol airport forces you on a route that takes through the duty free area which was the opposite way to where we needed to be heading. I decided to run to the gate and leave the rest of the family to catch up, I eventually got to gate 14 which is well over 1/2 a kilometer, to be greeted by a man who was just about to off load our bags from the areoplane, the saving grace here was the fact that between us there were 8 items in the hold baggage and it was quicker to get us on the flight than try and search the hold for the bags. The rest of the party arrived carrying a very upset toddler who was bursting for a wee and a baby, and various bags and baby bits. We realise that this is not the airlines fault and the blame is Bristol airport expanding the number of movements without putting better infrastructure in place first. There are stairs galore with very few lifts for disabled or people with pushchairs etc. This is an experience I never wish to repeat and after many years of using this airport I will not use it again!

✅ Verified Review | This airport is chaotic and badly run. The staff are officious, unhelpful and inefficient. They cannot cope with numbers. My husband and I lost a wonderful holiday to Ischia to spend his 75th birthday because of the long delays in everything starting with the queues at security. Ours was a 6.30 am flight and the airport was extremely crowded. After standing in line for 35 minutes, if not longer, my husband was stopped at the scanner despite not wearing any metal. We put it down to his rib staples after heart surgery, although this had never posed a problem before. Instead of just patting him down, they made a longer issue of it, costing us even more time, and eventually our flight. Don't fly from here unless you really must. Its badly designed with too many stairs and a complete nightmare.

✅ Verified Review | This is the second time that we have landed on a holiday flight at Bristol Airport. We were bussed to a small doorway and then had to proceed to go up and down stairs and around corridors. We were then held back by a member of staff for a while before going to passport control. Same old passport hall full of passengers but not many staff. 9 booths for self scan but only 4 open. One member of staff telling us where to stand in the queue. Took longer that the manual queue. Then went into the first Ladies toilet. One toilet out of action and another had the seat lying on the floor and the area covered in toilet roll. Disgusting. The last time we were told that 3 flights had arrived at the same time. Was this a surprise? The expansion is needed but the airport needs to do better with customer service. We are not stupid. I know the airport well enough to know that the bus could have delivered us nearer passport control, they were doing this to slow us down. We don't need this at 12.40am. However, on a positive note the departures experience was quite good and we had no hold up at security.

❎ Unverified | We had booked to fly to Murcia 6.45am flight from Bristol Friday 16th June. We arrived at the airport at 4.45am with hand luggage only. The queue for departures was the whole length of the airport and utter chaos. It took over an hour to even get to boarding pass control where again only 3 electronic boarding pass units were operating. After getting through this stage we joined a queue to eventually put our cases and electronic devices belts and liquids into trays and told to go through the security screen. Here we waited for 40 minutes as the conveyor belt was at a standstill due to cases that had been directed to a lane for searching - no staff were searching cases or manning the position. We begged the staff to put our trays through the security screen as last call for our flight, they did not care and were walking around unresponsive to people's desperate dilemmas. We eventually asked a member of staff who was attending to a wheelchair traveller and she rang the gate to hold the check in time for us and got another member of staff to move our trays to an alternative security conveyor belt which allowed us to just make the flight. This experience for us and other travellers was unacceptable and extremely stressful.

❎ Unverified | Kept waiting in corridors for passport control. In view of recent events I find it unbelievable that passengers are treated like cattle and herded by bored staff into corridors with no fire escapes. When you see signs on the wall that "abuse will not be tolerated" it makes you wonder what some passengers have had to put up with. Welcome to Great Britain. More like a third world country. Find another airport. Come on easyJet and Ryanair sort out the airport or everyone will be going Flybe from Exeter.

✅ Verified Review | Chaos at security in Bristol Airport. Today, 23rd, was the same as Monday 19th. 30+ mins to get through. Not all security lanes operating. Were so many flights departing a surprise? Airport seems unable to cope with its growth plans, this weeks operations seem unsustainable.

✅ Verified Review | I have traveled from Bristol Airport many times, unfortunately the new improvements have had a negative effect on the experience. The security systems have been expanded and apparently improved! Long queues and when we got to the front security people were very rude. I was shouted at for not putting my case in a tray - I had never had to do this before so could have been told politely, I then made an error of putting my toiletries in 2 clear plastic bags. I did this as last time I travelled I was asked to spread my toiletries into 2 so they were easier to view even though they did fit into one. Well this caused complete chaos as I gave the 2nd bag to my partner who didn't have any to save time. This resulted in him having to be searched and every item of my toiletries (all in branded bottles) being scanned indiviudally. I was then told to walk through the scanner - I tried to take my shoes off but told no need, the alarm goes off and I'm then shouted at by another member of staff for not taking them off. Then decided that my case needs to go back through scanner for no identifiable reason and be inspected. This caused a long wait for my case to be inspected and about 45 minutes total to get through security. It would be a lot easier if the staff weren't so rude and aggressive - I know you have to take electricals etc. out of your bag, belts of shoes off etc. but many people aren't regular travelers and don't really need to be shouted at. On return getting out of the airport is a nightmare - very long queues for passport control. Up and down stairs and long walk to get out. Car park doesn't recognise pre-paid tickets all very stressful.

❎ Unverified | My wifes flight from Bodrum arrived 10 minutes later than shown on the website. The easyJet plane then parked and the passengers were kept waiting for a further 15 minutes as there were no steps available apparently for them to get off. After exiting Passport control she was kept waiting for a further 50 minutes in the baggage pick up area waiting for her case to be unloaded. Bristol airport are clearly unable to cope with several planes arriving at the same time and don't have enough staff. The access road into and out of the airport from the A38 was completely jammed with traffic on the hottest day of the year so far. Sorry Bristol, you may be my local airport but in future I will drive to Cardiff.

❎ Unverified | Last evening I picked up my wife who was travelling back from Nice on easyJet. The airport website indicated that the flight was to arrive at 16.50, about 20 minutes late. I arrived at the airport shortly after 6.50 and since I thought it would take about 20 mins for her to claim her bag and come through I parked in the quick pickup area as I have done many times before. She finally emerged from baggage claim at 19.10, over an hour and 10 mins after the plane landed! She told me that the delay was due to there being no steps available to allow passengers to disembark and then it took ages for bags to come through. To make matters worse the exorbitant parking fee schedule ended up costing us £50.00! I could not move the car to an alternative lot since I might have missed her. Sorry Bristol Airport, but after having other miserable experiences there I will seek alternatives in the future.