Luton Airport

I have used Luton for many years and has been a joke from the start, now I feel I must write my latest views on this so called airport. With the new construction under way and the way they have handled it is "well" beyond belief, over 1 hour to get to so called drop off area and then having to pay £2.50 to get out, even that went up by 0.50p when construction started, one way of getting customers to help pay for mess. Now that's just outside wait till you go inside, even worse, no seating, long time to get into departure so called lounge. By the way express lane also went up from 2 to 3£ . Please tell me I not the only one who thinks this airport is a joke. The owner's may want to look outside the UK and get some better ideas. Anywhere will do as I have never seen anything as bad as Luton. Advice - don't fly from there as it will take a lot longer than the flight. One very unhappy customer.

Luton airport is just an awful experience. The terminal is a building site, the roads are always clogged (allow an extra 45 minutes for the last mile). Expect to be charged for everything. Charged for drop-off, charged for transit bus from the station, overcharged for car parks. They even charge you for the plastic bags at security that all other airports give away. I fully expect to be charged for a seat in the waiting area soon, except there aren't enough of them anyway. Luton airport clearly puts short-term profit over any passenger service. They have no notion of looking after their customers. It's the nearest airport to my home, but I'm coming around to the idea of travelling a bit further and not getting stressed and ripped off.

Luton airport train station is not suitable for an airport with people carrying baggage - few lifts and escalators. Bus is a joke, especially as they charge you £2 in cash only and then squish you on like sardines. Security is slow and the airport is over crowded. I spend a lot of time travelling and as a general rule I will do anything to avoid this airport even if it means spending more money or travelling for longer. It is the worst start or end to a holiday or business trip.

Worst experience possible at Luton airport - £2 to get the shuttle bus to the station, and they will only accept cash, so you have to queue at one of their cash points for ages. Passport control queues took ages - what a way to greet people coming into the UK. Absolutely awful.

Arrived at Luton Airport from Israel. The flight landed at approximately 02:30. The first encounter was that there was no passenger air bridge for passengers alighting from the plane to the airport building. My wife and I, are nearly 70 years old, had to descend from the aircraft via a flight of steps, make our way by foot, in the cold, to the airport building and claim up a further flight of stairs to enter passport control department and baggage reclaim department. These very difficult operations for an elderly couple were accomplished while carrying our hand luggage. After passing through passport control and the baggage reclaim, I visited the Gentleman’s toilet. To my horror, the toilets were dirty. I do not know when they were last cleaned. In addition, which was even more disturbing, was that there was no liquid soap in both soap dispensers. I do not know how you are able to operate a public entity, such as an international airport in such conditions. I believe that not having soap available to clean one’s hands is inexcusable. On departure, we again unfortunately had to fly from Luton Airport. The airport departure lounge was full of waiting passengers and there were not any seats available for my wife and I to rest before our return flight.

It took us nearly three hours to go through customs and to collect our baggage, longer than it took to fly from Portugal. Reason was not enough staff. This airport should cut down on the number of flights until it can man the airport properly. Will avoid flying from Luton in future, be quicker to drive to Stansted.

Awful parking at Luton Airport. I realise there is going to be disruption at the airport as it expands and new facilities are built and the resulting delays this causes, but to charge for the terrible parking facilities on top of that is outrageous. £2.50 just to let someone out of the car, and £7.00 to park for 30 minutes is completely out of order considering the quality of the car park (congested and full of large potholes). These high costs are directly resulting in huge delays to traffic on the approach to the airport as people stop to let passengers out of cars, even on roundabouts. I'm convinced this is due to the high parking charges. You would have thought that to compensate passengers for all the chaos they would make short term parking free - it is after all extremely low quality. I will do whatever I can to avoid Luton.

Avoid if you can - Luton airport definitely puts profits first and has completely neglected passengers. The access route which normally should take 8 minutes, took us 40 minutes and I saw people getting off and just walking the last mile probably frustrated with the backlog. The airport has a bad habit of setting up flights from the same airline with the very similar departure times resulting in bag drop off madness. There were 7 flights departing from Wizz Air on Sunday, all within 30 minutes which meant there were hundreds of people trying to check in their luggage and only 4 windows open to accommodate that. At the same time all other airlines bad drop of was empty. Airport staff was overwhelmed and did nothing to manage the situation. They treated customers like cattle, I have never seen anything like this on any other UK airport. Drop off and parking area is a building site, there is no staff anywhere, just charging machines which only take coins. Just nightmare. Avoid this place like the plague.

Luton Airport is a hot mess. Passenger drop off and pick up are now chargeable, and traffic moves so slowly to even get to parking / drop off / pick up at 5:30am it took an extra 30 minutes to reach the terminal. Huge queues for check in (easyJet) and especially through security. We left 2.5 hrs buffer before the flight but even with that because of the huge delay in getting to the drop off, the long queue to check in and slow security it was barely enough. There is never ending construction everywhere - inside and out - poor signposting, cramped spaces, little seating and fees for everything from drop off to luggage carts. I've flown from every airport in London including Southend, all Heathrow terminals, Stansted and Gatwick and Luton is by far the worst I've ever experienced. Avoid at all costs.

Dropped off my parents on Sunday 19th June. Arrived in good time off the M1 motorway to arrive at 7pm. However the last mile (normally takes 8 mins) was clogged with traffic and took 45 minutes. Chaos near the airport as the roundabout was blocked by the very large volume of traffic. I saw at least 20 people get out of stationary cars in the pouring rain as they were making the last 1000m to the terminal perhaps concious of the non moving traffic. £2.50 drop off zone and also uncovered. Hundreds of people in the open rain waiting for delayed cars , buses and taxis. Horrid. Avoid. Reading other reviews it seems a common occurrence.