UK tourists to some of Europe’s most popular holiday destinations could face hours of delays because of additional entry checks at EU airports in a no-deal Brexit, an investigation has found.
Consumer group Which? has identified the EU airports where UK passport holders could face disruption and found that Alicante in Spain faces being worst affected.
Some 43% of all passengers entering the airport arrive from the UK and, in a no-deal Brexit, it would need the staff and resources to deal with an additional 201 hours of immigration checks, on average, each day.
Rory Boland, travel editor of Which?, said: “Airports can be chaotic at the best of times, but if additional checks at passport control in Spain, Italy and other popular EU destinations are implemented in the event of a no-deal, it seems that very long queues are going to be an unwanted side effect.
“Until there is a deal or these airports announce simpler arrangements, you should consider what you may need if you have to fly to them - as it is very likely that you’ll be in a queue for several hours. Make sure you have food, water and essentials for kids like nappies to hand.”
Six of the top 10 busiest airports for UK arrivals are in Spain.
As well as Alicante, Tenerife South, Lanzarote, Malaga, Ibiza and Palma de Mallorca airports all potentially face severe difficulties if a contingency plan is not put in place to manage the new requirements.
The Spanish government has yet to announce how it will tackle the additional immigration checks. This means that immigration officials will be obliged to check UK visitors’ passport validity, passport expiry date, purpose and length of stay, and whether visitors can support themselves financially.
The European Tourism Association (ETOA) has estimated that additional checks required in a no-deal Brexit could add an extra 90 seconds for each UK passport holder.
It would take a single passport lane in an EU airport an extra 17,010 seconds, or nearly 5 hours, to process 189 passengers on a single Ryanair flight, if all arrivals had UK passports.
And with each new flight arriving, that additional processing time will lead to further delays. Having checked Alicante airport’s arrivals on Friday, Which? found that as many as 10 planes arrive from the UK in a single hour.
Although Faro airport in Portugal has the biggest proportion of UK arrivals overall, the Portuguese prime minister has already announced plans to ease congestion by opening special fast-track lanes at both Faro and Funchal airports.
This comes as UK government technical papers last year revealed that flights between the UK and EU could be grounded and British farm exports blocked under a no-deal Brexit.
In addition to airline flight disruption, the technical notices indicated that motorists, pet owners, truck drivers, chemical and tech firms would all face new costs, red tape and delays.
Under a no-deal outcome, EU-issued aviation licences would no longer be valid and airlines would have to seek individual permissions to operate across Europe, one document stated.
Mike Spicer, director of research and economics at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: “There will be major concerns in industries like aviation and road haulage that operate routinely across borders at European scale, that their markets will be fragmented by new licensing or regulatory frameworks.”