Paris CDG Airport

One of the worst experiences I've had. This was the second time I traveled through Paris CDG hoping that my first time was a fluke. It turned out worse then the first. If you're an English speaker - prepare yourself for rude comments, agents making faces, not recieving the right directions, or being ignored. I gladly pay extra few hundred dollars per flight just not to pass through this airport again.

Two passport desks open for a planeful of passengers on a Saturday morning. So there's a 1 hour just to get to baggage area. The muttering in the queue is "typical French" and I'm afraid the first impression for travellers is of a country in decline.

I flew through Paris Charles de Gaulle airport this summer on transit to New York JFK from Toulouse. Staff were nice and helpful. Everything seemed to work together in a very efficient way. A problem I did see was that there were not enough seats in the terminal when waiting for the plane back to Toulouse. There were plenty of shops (as expected). I thought this airport was a lot easier to travel trought than others.

Arrived on an Air France flight which was delayed, connecting Air France flight was shown on the monitor with the wrong gate resulting in me missing my flight. The girl on the desk was extremely rude, she obviously missed the customer service training day. Managed to get a transfer two hours later so had to wait. Poor wifi connection and a dirty terminal, eventually just as we were about to board a cleaner arrived to vacuum the carpet. We had a pleasant holiday in Milan but the awful experience at ten airport spoil the end.

Avoid Paris CDG Airport at all costs. The signage is non-existent and most of the staff are indifferent and unhelpful. If you must go, allow hours extra. We arrived on an international flight carrying several hundred passengers to find two toilets available in the terminal. But the worst experience was our departure. We got to Terminal 1, Hall 3 at 7.30 am for our 12.35pm flight, well in advance, trying to be proactive. There were no signs anywhere with directions or flights. We waited in line for over an hour only to be told in a very rude way when we made it to the rope maze that we couldn't check in until 9.00am and would need to stand in another line. The woman took us to where the line would start. Then, the same employee, knowing we were traveling to DC, came back over to wave us to a different waiting area. Then, at 9.00, we notice that all this time, the line to check in for the DC flight had been forming at yet a different place, and by this time, it was at least 150 feet long, stretching along another side of the hall, behind it, then turning and snaking back. We had to get to the very end of it and we waited for an hour and a half again to check our bags. By the time we finally got past security (without stopping for any food - we just frantically dashed), we arrived at our gate 30 minutes before boarding time. Yes, so we arrived to the United hall 5 hours before our flight was to leave, and we got to our gate 30 minutes before boarding. This is the worst airport.

The most abysmal experience at a airport for over 50 years. Most disorganised airport I have ever had the misfortune to use in my life. The security and passport control checks were at a snail's pace and to add to the misery under staffed. Five booths open for three queue stretching outside to the terminal entrances. Despite informing various staff regarding the consequences of the delay and boarding flights they kept on reassuring that the flights will be delayed. A number of people were not able to board their flights including myself. I was told to go to customer services where the airline didn't want to accept responsibility despite the fact that I had been waiting over an hour in the queue. Air France staff were helpful to a certain extent but overall beyond third rate. Never again CDG or Air France.

The passport control on arrival at Paris CDG was so jammed that the queue stretched all the way around the terminal into the duty free shopping area by several hundred metres. We allowed 2 hours for a TGV connection and we would never have made it as the queue was barely moving. Pleas to the arrogant staff on duty directing the queue fell on deaf ears. We were fortunately saved by a lovely couple who gave us a priority card. Departure was an equal fiasco. Queues of several hundred passengers with just one officer for EU and one officer for non-EU. The arrogance is numbing. The passport inspection is perfunctory at best. France expects 100 million tourists by 2020. Why come? You will never see the wonderful country - you will be stuck in the immigration queue.

I entered a men's room and there was no toilet paper. At the security checkpont coming from the connecting flight (there were several flights arriving at about the same time), they had only one screening crew creating a huge line of people, many of whom were on the tight schedule and I'm not even sure if they made their connections. At the security checkpoint they opened my perfectly sealed duty free shop bag and then didn't reseal it properly causing me to give up a couple of bottles in Montreal, my next connecting point. Overall my experience at the CDG airport was by far the worst. This was my very first time going through Paris and I will go out of my way in the future to avoid it. Completely useless.

Paris CDG airport is clean, fast and efficient. I have a EU passport, so going through immigration was smooth and super fast with the PARAFE automatised system. Even at the security check, plenty of checkpoints open which means no line up and no waiting time there. After customs, plenty of shops, great.

We allowed 4 hours from Paris central for our international departure to Singapore from Paris CDG. Took 1.5hrs to reach the airport and once checked-in with the efficient and courteous Singapore Airlines, we found ourselves confronted by arrogance and tangible indifference to international travellers to get to our departure gate. EU passport holders had a dream run through the French customs gates with no waiting. Other international travellers were treated with utter contempt. Extremely long lines with only 4 customs gates open to process these passengers (of the up to 12 gates available for processing). After waiting for well over an hour with little progress in the long queues, we and other people were becoming extremely concerned that we would miss our flight (appeals to officials to open more gates fell on deaf ears). Finally after over 1.5 hours amongst very agitated and desperate people trying to jump the long queues to catch their flights we cleared customs and got to our gate 10mins before our flight. We were later told that despite Singapore Airlines delaying our flight by over 20mins to help their passengers stuck in the customs queues, over 20 people still missed the flight. This was not a security issue, but simply arrogance and indifference to international tourists. Sadly we had a very similar experience when we arrived here 5 weeks ago.