Manchester Airport

Not Verified | The airport security team is the most horrid experience in all my travels. You literally have to take almost everything out of your bags. Anything with a cord, any liquid, all electronics. Oh and boots off but not any other shoe. So bizarre. We had like 12 bins with all our stuff taken out and a tiny area for everyone to repack. The security ladies are snarky and absolutely rude! If I can avoid this airport in the future I will at all costs. I made a comment to my husband how inefficient this security process was. Well big mistake because one of the ladies heard me and proceeded to rip me a new one for 5 minutes in front of my children. I even told her to stop talking to me like that in front of my kids and she said she is concerned with my behavior and what I will be like on the plane if I’m told something I don’t like. Really lady! Get a life. Never ever had this experience. Avoid this place like the plague if you can. I am mortified with the way they treat people.

✅ Trip Verified | My partner and I have vowed never to use this airport again. I was expected to place my asthma inhalers in the liquids bag (they are powder) and put out my hair straighteners separately. No other airport does this. Security check staff were shambolic and incompetent, and also rude. The time from placing articles in the trays to leaving the security area was over an hour. My partner's trays were scanned and diverted to the additional check area. The member of staff asked the question "has anyone interfered with this tray since you packed it". Only the security staff had access to it! He then returned the trays to the scanner, one of which was again diverted. The tray with his coat was sent through. Another member of staff picked up the tray from the middle of the rapidly-filling conveyor and returned it to be put through the scanner again. This time the tray and contents were ok to be collected. All the time this was happening, two customer interviewers were completing interviews on their tablets themselves, without referring to customers. There were also Union people milling around with clipboards. It was complete chaos, with disgruntled customers hanging around waiting for their trays and the staff not doing their jobs. When one customer stated that no other airport in the UK goes through such measures, he was told "no other airport cares about your security".

✅ Trip Verified | The absolute pits and a rip off. I use MAN as my UK Hub every time I fly in/out, four times per year, in and out. I can almost excuse the deplorable Security Staff's rudeness. It must be a thankless task but they do give the impression of not caring how long they take. If they check a bag you get the full treatment at their pace. Camera out. Book out. Laptop already out. I tried to retrieve my handkerchief to deal with an incipient sneeze and actually got my hand slapped with the search wand. Really. Perhaps they wanted my germs? But that is not my chief gripe with this rip off. We pay a few bob in landing fees to use the place and they cannot even supply a trolley without stealing another quid off you. I know of no other airport that charges for luggage trolleys. It is not as though they are not making money from the forced march through acres of shops that create an obstacle course on your way to the gate. And to cap it all they are now removing any payphones that one can use to call friends and family to advise progress and arrange pick up. What a place. And they talk about a £1Bn improvement plan. Well I can tell them where they should spend that kind of money in providing a decent place to fly from. Seats. Signs and service to those paying for it. I can't say 'Never again' as sadly I need to use it to serve my travel needs.

✅ Trip Verified | It gets worse every time I travel from Manchester airport. Security checks vary - shoes off, belts off, watches, pockets emptied of everything or a combination of the above. Today my bag was taken off the track and eventually we got it without swabbing! A random selection apparently. The swabbing team seem to delight in the anxiety caused. Not surprised to find that many others agree with me. Not been to a worse airport security set up.

✅ Trip Verified | The worst security wait ever at this airport. Travelled 000's of miles in many different airports in the world and this is the worst - one and a quarter hours in a cattle pen waiting to go through the security process. Appalling management. No contingency planning, no capacity for remedial action. Complained to customer services - in their response they said their target wait was fifteen minutes and they were implementing a programme of customer service training. I explained that this was not the point. In view of their waiting target they had failed by 500% and no amount of smiling at people would cure chronic management failures on that scale. Hopeless. Liverpool is now my preferred gateway to the North West. Very frustrating that Manchester Airport Group uses its customer service to insulate senior executives from the impact on customers of their poor management.

✅ Trip Verified | The worst airport in the world. Scruffy, lazy staff. And the rudest security staff imaginable. I've travelled a lot, but the way one is treated in the queue to security before check in is unimaginably bad. 2 men shouting at travellers, completely unacceptable.

Not Verified | The security procedure is an absolute shambles and extremely inefficient for an international airport that handles a lot of passengers every day. They were pulling a lot of bags to the side and it seemed that they would deliberately take their time and were showing no concern that people had flights to catch. The staff were very abrupt and somewhat rude. Terrible staff and airport.

Not Verified | Departures: Terminal 1 is acceptable excluding the drop-off and parking. First you go through the check-in hall which is fairly spacious but needs a do-over but it only gets worse from there. Next you go down a fairly small set of stairs into security. T1 security is a packed, stuffy, low-ceilinged hellhole of a room. Luckily I got through there fairly fast and into the departures lounge, which is the best part of the terminal - it is modern, open and packed to the brim with toilet facilities and shops, along with a travel-money stand, which is quite useful. Unfortunately there is a long hike through a department store to get to the gates. On the other side of the store the were some fast-food chains and a large window with a bench and table running across it. This is a plane-spotter's paradise. My flight was at gate 21 which I found to be downstairs, on a wall there was an illustration and some writing saying that there was free wifi for 3 hours, never used it though as I was on my mum's hotspot. We took a packed to the brim bus to parking stand 71, past where the FedEx 757 hibernates during the day to our Thomas Cook airbus A321. It was raining out (no surprise) and we had to take slippery, corrugated steps up the the narrow-body airbus which could have had something over it to make it less dangerous. Arrival: This time we got a jet-bridge and it was very fast getting off MT-231 and traversing our way through the terminal. Customs was very smooth and empty, and before we knew it we were out onto the carpark.

✅ Trip Verified | Most appalling service in all areas. Very intimidating security with the most stupid and nonsense procedures which don’t make a flight any more secure. It seems as if they employ staff who leave their remains of a brain at home when they come to work. Moreover the amount of shopping offers you have to work your way through till you are able to get to the gates feels like a violation of my right to choose with whay kind of marketing I am bombarded with. Will try to avoid this airport.

Not Verified | Drop-off parking is just robbery wearing a uniform. I have always viewed this airport as a jewel in the crown of the North West, but they have just proved to be the same cowboys as every other rip-off airport in the UK. This airport is just a high cost bus station. Shame on you!