Manchester Airport

Manchester airport must be the most passenger unfriendly airport in the UK. I arrived happy and fresh from a great holiday in Mallorca at 1.20pm Sat 28th Sep. 45mins frustrating queuing at passport control for EU passengers. Trying to extract a trolley from the useless and money grabbing Trolley Pay Station-lost 3 pounds and hurt my arthritic hand. Longer wait at Carousel 5 waiting for a suitcase that I eventually found out was still at Palma airport. I left the airport some 4 hrs later feeling shattered. All airport staff should be given a much needed course learning that passengers are human who should be treated with respect.

Flew from Terminal 1 on 27th September. Was checked in by 5am and security was chaos with people spilling out of the security area into the check-in area due to weight of numbers. After a long wait in a windowless hot environment finally got through however not a pleasant experience at all. Manchester is my local airport and I fly from here several times a month. In recent months Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 security has become a nightmare and I am beginning to dread this every time I fly. Unfortunately however Liverpool does not offer a lot of routes so I am very muck stuck with using Manchester. Particularly in Terminal 1 considerable investment has been made in extra retail space but I never use it due to time and also not being in a shopping mood after the security experience and I imagine retailers are suffering as a result.

I have been scathing about Manchester in the past and was loath to use this airport after the last few times but found myself booked on three trips this year. This was the first and I have to say it was an eye opener. My dislike of MAN is based on several trips where staff and facilities have been woefully short of the minimum you would expect. This last trip was a welcome exception. The fast track was operating well and the staff at screening were courteous and efficient (a first for me at MAN) and we were through in a few minutes. On my last return through MAN we were held on a corridor for over an hour with no explanation and then faced with surly immigration staff and long long waits for luggage to get onto the belt. To my immense relief the organisation was far better on this trip. The queues for immigration were relatively short and by using the automated booths were through in less than ten minutes. They do need more of these booths though and to keep them in working order. Baggage was on the belt within ten minutes of us reaching it and we were off the plane and out of the airport in a little under 30 minutes all told. A much better experience. I can only hope this is norm now and not a lucky hit.

Flew out on 7th September. Arrived at 5.15 for 7.35 departure. Took more than an hour to check-in and then joined horrendous queue at security. Had to be pulled out of queue in order to make our flight. Does anyone have time to shop in duty-free? We certainly didn't. Coming back was less stressful. Large queues at passport control but at least kept moving. However a very long walk from aircraft to baggage reclaim especially for parents who had young children to carry.

Flew from T1 on 13 September 2013 to Pisa. Huge queues at check in and security. Returned on 17th September to be met by huge queues again at security. Not surprisingly the duty free shop was well staffed and laid out but I did not have time to shop there!! The airport management need to spend more on security facilities and less on revenue generation. I will avoid Manchester in future.

Terminal 1 - arrived 05.15 for 07.30 departure . Carry on bag only. Already checked in on line. Queue for security stretched right through terminal to outside drop off zone. Processing very slow barely made my flight along with many others. Retail obstacle course really aggravating and of course pointless after all the delay. Having read previous reviews it appears something is basically wrong here.

Flying back to Southampton experienced appalling shambles at security. Gigantic and slow moving queues in the middle of a weekday afternoon. Apparently there are 'improvements' afoot but there is no excuse for this disgraceful third world scene. Shame on the management.

I am a frequent flyer and pass through Manchester at least once every month on business. Unfortunately I depart/arrive via Terminal 3. Departure has been a nightmare for many months now and the fast track takes longer than the normal queue. Staff simply do not care (or there is no one on duty) and people move freely between the normal queue and fast track. I departed there on Tuesday 3rd Sep and it was just the same. Arrivals is even worse as quite often you arrive at the same time as other flights and the queues for immigration are horrendous. On Friday 7th June I arrived on a flight and we disembarked at the far NE end of Terminal 3 to be immediately met with a queue that stretched as far as the eye could see (I photographed the queue being careful to capture the '2010 travel awards winner' proudly displayed on the wall) (for those of you that don't know the terminal the immigration control is in the centre). Unfortunately there was also a queue from the far SE end of the terminal and they had precedent over our side so we had to walk from the NE end of the terminal to the SE end and then join the end of that queue. There must have been four flights queuing. There was one immigration officer dedicated to Foreigners and max 3 for UK nationals. It took one hour to pass and I'd been travelling for 24hrs already that day. I came through again in July and August and had a similar but not quite as bad experience having to wait only 15 and 20 minutes respectively. The terminal is simply not up to the task of handling the volume it passes through. There are no automated 'chipped passport' scanners. Then once you get through immigration you have an equally frustrating wait at baggage handling. I wrote this review because the issues are long standing and show no sign of improving. I'm looking at either changing carrier or airport as Liverpool is only a few miles further away. So be warned if you plan to use this terminal. On the plus side when I go on holiday it is usually via terminal 1 and there I have no problems.

Terminal 1. Tried to check in for a flight leaving at 7.10am on 31/08/13. The queues went through the terminal and out through the door. Because of delays in security an airport employee patrolled the Fast Lane calling out flight times to take people out of the queue into the Fast Lane. This is not efficient as the estimated time to get through security has been seriously underestimated by the employee. When we finally got through security we were refused embarkation at the departure gate as this had closed. There are four basic problems at Terminal 1: 1) Too many early morning flights. 2) Security is understaffed and extremely inefficient. 3) Because of high aircraft charges for checked in bags more hand luggage is having to be checked in. 4) When you finally manage to clear Security you then have to fight your way through the Duty Free area to try and get to the departure gates in time.

Terminal two at Manchester airport on 5th Aug 2013. We had a flight to Dalaman and we were checked in very quickly by the check-in staff who were smartly dressed and very polite. Went up to the security area to be held up for all of 5 mins which for Manchester was extremely good. We passed through with no hassle at all and was even told by staff to have a good flight/holiday which again we found very good for Manchester (which is not the norm). We found our gate after going through dutyfree shop. At 9.35am the plane pulled onto the stand (214) and we had to wait for all the passengers/baggage to be taken off before we could board at 10am we started to board our Onur Air flight to Dalaman we were all on by 10.15am and we pushed back. We will be flying out of T2 MAN again in the future.