London Heathrow Airport

Three recent return flights from T1. I must be one of the lucky ones as I've had no major problems. All flights more or less off on time. Ground staff and security were all fine although on one occasion they took a little too much interest in my hard drive and drug-screened my whole bag and re-scanned it twice - rather over-zealous I feel. Check-in very quick on all occasions - no queues. All flights held in holding patterns but no significant delays. The usual good facilities airside. No problems on arrival other than 15-20 minute waiting times for bags. Immigration quick efficient friendly and adequate staff.

Flew from the Middle East on December 20 2012 to Terminal 4 transferred to Terminal 1 to make a connecting flight. Security staff at Terminal 1 rude chatting amongst themselves while they decided to select my carry on for a random search by a woman with a poor command of English. Both I and my colleague explained that we had to make a connecting flight staff couldn't have cared less continued to take their own sweet time chatting amongst themselves told us and other people travelling with small children to "be patient" before attempting to open our luggage. We missed our flight staff at the British Airways desk were sympathetic and concurred that security staff in Terminal 1 were rude to them and have resulted in many passengers missing flights. Heathrow airport transfers are not for the faint hearted poor signposting I would not recommend for anyone elderly the distances are huge and it is easy to get lost. Very dated.

I've come through Heathrow five times this year so far and it's always a breeze and never have to wait more than 10 minutes waiting to get through customs. The revamp of T3 and T4 are great. Free airport Wi-Fi was near impossible to get on as with most airports. No free kiosks either or places to plug in devices. No places to lay down only seats. There was a couple of TV's showing sports but you couldn't hear them very well due to the noise of the hundreds of people in the terminal etc. Heathrow still feels dated in places mainly baggage claim and customs. Compared to some SE Asian airports like Singapore we are a decade behind.

LHR Terminal 4 Wednesday 12 December 2012 19.05. Queue of more than 1 hour (which you don't know when you step in) probably because of fog in the morning (if there were more runways this issue would not have been so severe). No communication as to why this situation exists when asking for help there was no willingness to support passengers having to catch their flight. No system dividing between people with earlier flights and people with later flights. No apologies given. Very very slow security: one scanner for 2 baggage lines. No separate baggage line and scanner for Fast track. If the scanner beeps you have to wait for more than 2 minutes so queue gets even longer. Very poor service of LHR terminal 4 please improve. Thanks to KLM I did not miss my flight.

T4 security queue made me miss my flight (1 hr 15 minutes in the queue). What is the use of flying if you have to be there two hours before just to go through security. Next time I'll definitely try to avoid Heathrow.

Travelling to London from Palm Springs via Dallas (frequently) we arrived at Terminal 5 which was very impressive clean efficient our luggage took minutes to arrive and we were through immigration in 15 mins. They were polite and welcomed us. Departing T5 was a breeze lots of helpful staff spacious light and pleasant check in hall. Security fast and efficient and more shops and restaurants than I have seen at any other airport other than possibly Amsterdam but the food is much better at T5. Interesting to hear Americans moan about immigration lines I have been in line for 4 hours at LAX on 3 occasions and similar waits at MIA on many occasions. I do agree that free WiFi would make a huge difference but over all I think it is one of the best terminals in the world.

A tale of two Terminals - my flights into and out of Terminal 5 were fine with courteous security staff and immigration officials. However my experience at Terminal 1 was horrific and echoes many comments also written here. The worst aspect for me was having my bag (laptop bag in my case) taken aside for a random second inspection but then seeing it left there for ages in a rack while staff laughed and chatted amongst themselves seemingly oblivious to the fact that we have flights to catch. At Australian airports such 2nd random searches are carried out promptly and courteously by another officer further on in the process and that's fine. However at Heathrow Terminal 1 I had my bag left in a side rack for ages with staff wandering off somewhere else for a chat and a laugh. I for one will try to avoid using Heathrow Airport and spending money at its airport hotels and restaurants and instead spend my time and money using a northern European hub such as Frankfurt in the future.

It had been many years since I last visited Heathrow so I was essentially starting afresh. This was the final part of a lengthy flight from Adelaide to London via Sydney and Singapore so I was hoping for a smooth experience. Fortunately this was what I got. We had an easy departure from our plane despite having to wait till last due to having a family member on crutches. The airport staff immediately arrived with a wheelchair for assistance and then fetched a golf buggy to get us around quicker. Staff were very friendly and we got through immigration within a matter of minutes. Having had to wait behind on the plane our bags had concluded their cycle on the conveyor belt so ours had been placed to one side to collect which further sped things up. Restrooms were extremely clean and modern we managed to navigate the airport with little or no problems at all and the freezing cold outside instantly shook off any lost sleep on the flight.

I hate transiting through Heathrow specifically for two reasons: Immigration control and security. I have to clear immigration before connecting to my UK flight and there is always no more than two Border Agency officers on duty. They are either belligerent or disinterested towards non-EU passengers like myself. There are two lines-one for EU citizens and the other for non-EU citizens-where each time the officers give preference towards EU citizens while ignoring those in the non-EU line. My advice is for non-EU citizens to make sure to have at least 2 hours to transit because of this ridiculous practice. As to security it has become a nightmare recently. On my most recent experience my handbag was 'randomly' selected for a thorough search. To make matters worse the security officials take their leisurely time. I did not have my handbag checked until after a good 20 minutes of waiting around. They do not care that many passengers are in a hurry to catch their flights! Instead I noticed officials joking and talking amongst themselves oblivious to these randomly selected bags they need to check because passengers are waiting for them! This type of supposedly extreme checking is a huge farce really accomplishes nothing but hassle to the passengers. If not for the immigration & security issues Heathrow's T5 is quite nice provided one has time to actually relax and shop and eat. I lost so much time on my outbound journey due to the idiotic procedures of immigration and security that I could barely get to buy some water and use the toilet.

I had an outbound and inbound flight to T5 so I will write them separately. Outbound: Excellent in one word no queues extremely fast first check in with courteous staff and staff that appeared interested in you and your plans. Passport control and security was empty and so we split up between fast track and normal both ending at the same time. I was searched and x-rayed routinely but it was an efficient and non-invasive process. Excellent facilities for shopping and eating but there is one drawback with T5 which is the short amount of time they leave to publish the departing gate number which was alright for our flight as it was an A gate but there were B and C gates being called close to departure which does not allow for enough time to be given to transfer to the satellite terminals comfortably. Boarding was pleasant with priority boarding and happy staff. Inbound: The C satellite terminal had problems trying to attach the tunnel to the plane which meant we lost the 20 minutes of flight time we had made up as well as extra time but the captain and crew were very reassuring. Once we were disembarked the transition to the main terminal was quick and efficient with a train for the transit system arriving at C as we made it to the platform. Immigration was fast with staff that wee polite and friendly and too interest in your travels. By the time we reached the carousel our luggage was coming round resulting in disembarking to taxi rank in just under 20 minutes.