Misery at airports as e-Gates stop working across UK: Thousands of holidaymakers are condemned to queue for hours overnight because of 'planned maintenance'

Hundreds of holidaymakers are condemnded to queue for hours overnight because e-gate passport controls stop working across the country.

With reportedly limited staff on shift at Gatwick and Luton airports causing lengthy queues, passengers said this was not the perfect ‘welcome to the UK’. 

As the chaos continued to unfurl, customers took to social media to express their anger at the ‘shambles’ with one person branding it ‘the latest episode of “nothing works in this country”‘.

They added that the elderly, disabled and those with children were being forced to wait in the long queues. 

The carnage for those landing in the UK was caused by planned ‘routine maintenance across all airports’, a London Gatwick spokesperson confirmed to MailOnline. 

Thousands of people are forced to wait in lengthy queues at Gatwick Airport 

As the chaos unfurled, customers took to social media to express their anger at the situation

‘We apologise to passengers for any inconvenience experienced,’ the Gatwick spokesperson added. 

After landing at Luton airport and immediately being faced with carnage, Ashraf Michail, said: ‘Someone clever at Luton airport decided to close the e-gates subjecting hundreds of passengers to misery.’ 

Another customer called Geraldine said she had been ‘up for 22 hours straight’ after waiting over an hour to get through immigration at Luton. 

A Luton airport spokesperson said: ‘We are aware that some passengers experienced longer than usual wait times at immigration in the early hours of this morning whilst national maintenance work took place on the e-gates which are operated by Border Force. 

‘The welfare of our passengers is always our number one priority and additional airport staff were on hand to provide assistance. 

‘We apologise for any impact this may have had to passenger journeys.’

Holidaymakers in other UK airports such as Bristol are also said to be experiencing issues. One customer said: ‘You can always rely on Bristol Airport to dismiss any “feel good” feeling after a holiday.

One X user branded it ‘the latest episode of “nothing works in this country”‘

Hundreds of holidaymakers are condemnded to queue for hours overnight because e-gate passport controls stop working across the country

The carnage for those landing in the UK was caused by planned ‘routine maintenance across all airports’

‘Five flights arriving in the space of 30 minutes, over an hour long queue for PP (passport) control with children at 1am and all the e-gates are closed … I wonder if our bags will be there.’ 

This comes as a video posted to X captures passengers sighing in disbelief as their told over the tannoy: ‘Hey folks, might be worth sitting down, they’ve just said the steps that are out there are broken and they’re going to get some more over here…so anyway just sit down, hopefully they’ll come soon.’

Rosie Chilvers who posted the video said this followed a three hour delay and a ‘missed take off slot’. 

‘We can put people on the moon but not get them off a plane,’ she added.  

A video posted to X captures passengers sighing in disbelief as their told over the tannoy it ‘might be worth sitting down, they’ve just said the steps that are out there are broken’ 

Rosie Chilvers who posted the video said this followed a three hour delay and a ‘missed take off slot’