Geneva Airport

Not Verified | Leaving Geneva, I was stopped by a customs agent. I have dual nationality, French/American and have not always had clear indications of which passport to travel with. I fly between Canada, the US and France (generally leaving from Geneva) about every 3 months. I generally use my US passport, under the apparently mistaken impression that you should use the same passport for a trip. I had seen this customs agent answer other passengers questions and then roll her eyes at their stupidity. She looked at my passport and started asking me questions and then said that I should be put in prison. It turns out that I should use my French passport in Europe and US passport in North America, thus changing mid-trip and gave me a lecture about the Schengen space, which Switzerland apparently belongs to although it's not part of the European Union and then repeated that I should probably pay a big fine. I don't mind being corrected and given correct information - I could deal without the eye rolling and the threatening (I'm a 70 year old woman). She certainly did not leave me with a good impression of the Swiss. I must say that this is the first time in my traveling like this (dual nationality) that I have been stopped and threatened with jail.

✅ Trip Verified | Signage is bad. Upon arrival it was difficult to see where the car rental area was. Most airports have pictures that are universally understood to tell you directions. From the baggage carrousel area there was no indication as to where to go. We asked an attendant outside and they directed us to a bus at the end of the airport (5 minute walk). We quickly ran to the end and got on the bus only to realize thankfully before it took off that you actually needed to go back inside to the building and get your keys from the car rental agency for the cars that were located away from the airport. Upon returning our vehicle not only did the GPS have it wrong for the return of the car but we could not even rely on the signage on the exterior of the airport to figure out where we go to return the car. It was only when we stopped an airport worker walking on the side of the road that we were turned around and headed to the opposite end of the airport for the car return. Again it’s just signage really and lack there of. When we finally returned the car in the Parkade and went down to wait for the bus to take us back to the airport we noticed another couple who had accidentally gotten on the bus only to find out that they needed to have gotten their keys at the airport so they too had the same problem only we were fortunate enough to figure it out before taking the ride out to the Parkade. Signage is bad. Needs upgrading.

✅ Trip Verified | Geneva Airport only cares to drive their revenues. No regard to the comfort of the passengers. Third world countries offer better quality services.

Not Verified | Old, outdated, crammed and, in many respects, uncomfortable (e.g. lack of escalators or escalators that frequently don’t work). Not what you’d expect from a major first world capital. In serious need of an upgrade!

Not Verified | The airport is very clean, the security line seems long but it's treated very efficiently. The signs are clear, however, regarding power outlets, those are hard to get because there are tables with 3 seats and 3 power outlets, but people decide to sleep on them, so save your battery. You only get 2 hours of free WiFi, no way to get more.

✅ Trip Verified | I just want to say how good the welcome for disabled people is. I was met at the aircraft by a very helpful man with a wheelchair and was whisked through arrivals in no time. He even found the disabled toilets and allowed time for me to use it before my onward journey, then out to find my onward transport and assistance on to the minibus. Could not have been more helpful and polite. Also a mention for the lovely man at Passport control who welcomed me by name with a big smile while checking my passport. I also used the service in the spring when returning from Switzerland to England and it was equally seamless.

✅ Trip Verified | This is a national embarrassment for the Swiss. I live in Lausanne and have the misfortune to need to use this airport every few weeks. It is awful, even much worse than Luton and Gatwick, something I thought would never be possible. Where do I start? Baggage takes forever to be delivered, and the delivery information on the screens is entirely fictional. The airport was last revamped in the 60s, and yet this does not stop food being priced at the highest levels I have seen anywhere. It seems to be ineptly managed - literally nothing works as it should. This must count as one of the worst welcomes, and therefore first impressions, in any country in the world. Its a major factor in my move to Zurich, which offers a correctly run airport.

❎ Not Verified | One of the worst airports I have ever travelled through. At 5.15am the line for security was huge. It is so poorly managed and staff who are supposed to give information are exceptionally rude, unhelpful and inept. They claim it is due to the holidays - well why not put on more staff to cope? It's not like it's a surprise as the whole of France goes on holiday from July to September. It is just a classic example of how bad airport security is. Shocking in a country that has so much wealth that they cannot put some money toward improving their third world shack of an airport. The arrogance, however, is typical of the Swiss.

✅ Trip Verified | We traveled as a family of 3 in June, 2019. It was fine when we arrived at the airport except when we tried to pick up our rental car and we found out that our car was at French side. Just like one of other reviewers mentioned here, we had to pull our big luggage to come out of the airport and re-enter into the French side. There was no clear signs to guide you to the French side and the ways to the French side were narrow. The escalator was not working as I saw the dad of a family of 4 with young children have to carry their big pieces of luggage up the stairs. This was not the worst part of our experience in this airport. When we flew out on June, 29 we wanted to check in our luggage. There were about 30 windows at the airport, but they only opened 6 windows to serve 12 airlines passengers to check in the luggage. Among the 6 windows, 3 of them were used to serve those first class and business class passengers. You can see that the line for economy cabin passengers were miles long and moved very slowly while the 3 windows that served first class and business class most of time did not have any passengers. Worried that we may miss our flight (although we thought we arrived at the airport with plenty of time), we tried to reach the staff 3 times and asked them whether we could check in our luggage by using those first class/business windows. (Of course they should always put their first/business class clients first, all we asked was to check our luggage when there were no first/business class clients). They refused us three times (one lady who looked like a manager even did not look at me when she said 'no' to her staff who consulted her whether she could help us. Her attitude and body language gave me the impression that we as the low class people only deserve poor service). We have traveled to about 20 airports in the world, so far I would say Geneva airport is the worst that I have ever experienced, several times, we got help from first/business class windows in other airports to check in our luggage and staff were always very nice. Finally, after waiting in the line for about 1 hour and 10 minutes (about 40 minutes before the flight departure time), they opened the first/business class windows to us. Luckily, the security line was surprisingly short and quick. We got on the flight on time. Had the security line been long and slow that day, we would definitely have missed our flight. I just don't understand why couldn't they open more windows for economy cabin passengers? There should have more windows to serve economy cabin passengers proportionally. (not half numbers of the windows to serve 20% clients) I would say, if you have other choices and money is not your first priority, try to avoid this airport. Actually, it is a risk to save some money and lose more money if you miss your flight.

✅ Trip Verified | We dropped off the car on the French side which was firstly extremely difficult to find and very badly signposted on the local roads. Then when in the airport we found out that this side only does French domestic, but there's no signs telling you this. So we had had to take heavy luggage through small openings, down escalators, through a shop and up another escalator without using a luggage trolley as you cannot fit a luggage trolley through the small openings. There are no signs telling you how to get from the French side to international check-in and it is not obvious (see above description). Staff just shrug their shoulders and tell you it's not their fault, which to some degree it isn't, but perhaps they could make suggestions to airport management or their employers as they must see people struggling with this every day. Are a few signs too much to ask for. They say that there's free Wi fi, but it needs some sort of code from your ticket, but not the one written on my boarding pass, so it couldn't be used. The worst airport I have ever flown from, and will never choose to fly from there again.