London Stansted Airport

✅ Trip Verified | This one is a troubled airport because they care more about increasing their profit margins than they care about their customers' experience. There aren't enough seats for the quantity of people they'd like to process at once, and the staff is on a mission to annoy customers who are forced to sit on the ground. The whole place is designed to offer maximum passenger discomfort. Perhaps in an attempt to process you as quickly as possible. I remember once the seating area by Costa was permeated by the putrid smell of a carcass or sewage which, according to one of the airport's staff, had been going on for a few weeks. Given the times I've had a below average travel experience flying from or to Stansted I now actively avoid this airport.

Not Verified | I found the charges to drop off my passenger at Stansted Airport (drive-through) just pure exploitation and a prime example of rip off ordinary citizen. Why such a patronizing fee. Drop off max 5 minutes and cost a driver £4 and computed the hourly rate is £48 per hour!. This is beyond disgraceful profiteering.

Not Verified | The people at security are the absolute worst. They pulled aside 90-95% of the bags that went through screening to hand check them, and you know why? Because everything counts as a liquid. The security agent that went through my bag told me that my jar of lip balm (not gloss, balm), my mascara, my solid lush face wash all counted as liquids and needed to fit into a sandwich size bag in order to keep it (like, a bag half the size of the normal allowance). When I was like “excuse you, my solid lip balm is not a liquid”, she said anything spreadable (including nutella or peanut butter) is a liquid and needs to fit in their tiny bags in order to take it with you. She gave me attitude about why I didn’t check my bag, if I’m from the US isn’t security stricter there (no, actually, they don’t count my mascara or solid lip balm or lip gloss as liquids that need to fit in the 1l bag). Anyway, the people at security are extremely rude and I am never going to fly through Stansted again.

✅ Trip Verified | Waiting for a flight to Sardinia, absolutely nowhere comfortable to sit. They provide a couple of short rails which can accommodate maybe 50 in discomfort, whilst hundreds wander round with nowhere to go, no attempt to make passengers comfortable. We are only useful to spend money in the few shops that are here. My advice is to avoid this place if you possibly can, they should go to Amsterdam or Bergamo to learn how to treat us like human beings.

Not Verified | Long queuing at the security check, the staff is arrogant, the security check is too thorough. Once I missed my flight because the staff refused to put my suitcase that got to the manual check line to the front although I clearly said I was going to miss the flight if they hadn't done so. Today again, 30 minutes in the line because of a keyboard and some cables in the hand luggage.

✅ Trip Verified | Other reviewers have noted the various issues that make flying via Stansted a bit gruelling. My particular gripe is the online departures board, which is consistently useless. When I select my flight – i.e. FR522 – it tells me that there are 'no results found'. And when I try to establish whether my wife's flight is airborne, all it tells me is 'scheduled'. I could go on. The web page tells me that "We are currently making improvements". OK – but this has been going on for at least 6 months, which one would have thought is long enough to get things right.

Not Verified | Where to start? Landside departures is looking it's age and I'm glad to see it's having a facelift. Airside departures is fine with plenty of choice, but the transfer signage to the gates was confusing, was the transit working to the gates or not? Even the staff weren't clear with information, so it was purely guesswork. Upon arrival, and walking into the terminal building (do those air bridges actually work?). We were met with poor signage, a non working escalator and an absence of staff. Practically all of the passengers from our flight were having to guess which way to go. Stansted Airport is a mess, it's WiFi connection is a joke, the place needs a serious refurbishment - sooner rather than later.

✅ Trip Verified | Stansted is a thoroughly miserable experience. From the extortionate long stay parking that is miles from the airport, to the cattle market style security lines, there is very little to be positive about. Having walked through the inappropriately sophisticated looking shopping mall it turned out the train to the satellite gate buildings was broken. A lengthy walk ensued through strange hallways and staircases to another miserable building. To top it off, Ryanair. Low-cost to the extreme. I would willingly pay extra to not have to fly from Stansted. Why on earth Emirates thinks it’s a good idea to fly from there I do not know.

Not Verified | Ended up at this god forsaken airport when Thomas Cook went belly up. Took the airport landing crew 20 minutes to connect the steps up to the aircraft and a further 90 plus minutes to unload the baggage. I will not be using this airport in the future.

Not Verified | Collecting my friends from Stansted. Ariving there are signs to indicate collection and drop off, there is no mention of this being an area with charges. Collecting my friends I headed to the exit and was met with a queue of people, there appeared to be no reasoning for the delay untill it was my turn to leave and I was asked to pay £25! There was no previous indication that there was a charge, each person making the exit was as shocked as me, this causes a queue to form. If this is how this airport operates, I will not be returning, what a terrible way to run an airport. I fly weekly from Gatwick, I often have the option to use Stansted, I would not return, it is clearly poorly managed.