It still occupies the minds in Thailand. On Friday night, thousands of passengers at Don Mueang airport had to wait four hours before they could pass through Immigration. Airport of Thailand has announced measures to improve the flow, including a reduction in check-in time.
The reason for the chaos of last Friday is now well known. First three delayed flights and a charter arrived, but shortly before 23.00 p.m. another nine delayed flights, meaning that 34 flights had to be processed within a period of four hours.
Like other airports in the world, Thailand cannot keep up with the growth in passenger numbers. Don Mueang's two terminals are designed to serve 39 million passengers per year. From October 1 last year to August 3, the airport handled 31 million travelers. As a result, the 42 Immigration agents are overworked. According to an Immigration employee, they have 16-hour workdays.
The Ministry of Tourism and Sports has asked Aeronautical Radio of Thailand and the Department of Airports to improve air traffic management to avoid congestion at both airports.
The airport also wants to occupy a building that was previously used for domestic travelers. A contractor will be sought for this next year. The work should be completed in 2020.
Check in
AoT president Nitinat says that the four APC machines (automated passport control), gates where Thai people can check in automatically, are not used enough. That should be because it shortens the waiting times.
The AoT will also increase the number of baggage scanning machines that were installed last month to fourteen.
The current check-in time is 45 to 60 minutes.
Source: Bangkok Post
The measures of the AOT can of course never solve the problem of the immigration service.
If there are too few officials, queues will continue to exist at the immigration service.
You can build extra counters, and larger waiting areas, but without officials to man them (staff to remain politically correct), they will remain empty.
The big question is, of course, why there seems to be a chronic lack of (immigration) officials.
The reasons: language skills in English and Chinese low, salary low, long working hours, no opportunities for extra earnings. Other police colleagues earn their money more easily. Just compare.
In Thailand people want to work for the Thai government. Because there are benefits such as lifelong appointment and salary, health insurance for civil servants for immediate family, pension, housing if necessary, prestige, possibilities for financing loans and perhaps other reasons. Popular among people.
Oh I found the 1.5 hours this week on bkk long. Really annoying glow after a long flight. They also work slow as snails those civil servants and 0 crowd/line management.
Mr Tom is absolutely right and those guys behind the counter don't give a damn about being rude
Example:
I am about to leave for the Netherlands and then stand in line at customs for more than 30 to 40 minutes, but at that moment I have a final call for passengers with a deadline of 15 minutes, so I am accidentally and luckily removed from the queue by the company together with all passengers for the same flight and even if you inform the officer that you are going to miss your flight, he will check whether he hears it in Cologne Thunder….
They don't really care because you are a tourist after all, but I'm certainly not the only one who is annoyed by this
And every official has his own rules and are just amateurs there because in the end you should not address me in Thai but English if you are behind that counter or not?
But yes …… the well-known proverb…..This Is Thailand……
Groet
TonyM
If you queue for 30 to 40 minutes and miss your flight, you didn't get to the airport on time.
For international flights, it is advised to be at the airport 3 hours in advance.
Say an hour before checking in your bag, 40 minutes at immigration, 30 minutes before departure when the gate closes, that gives you another 50 minutes to walk to your plane.
Seems more than enough to me.
Not that I don't think 30-40 minutes in line isn't too long, of course.
And no, the official doesn't care if you make your flight or not.
In front of you and behind you, the line is also full of people who are afraid of missing their flight.
What can he do about that?
Perhaps she can't be blamed for that. They are constantly instilled in bosses and in training that they work for the state and for the king and that mistakes can be deadly. That is why work here is not checked once, twice, but at least three times. In the Netherlands, civil servants are convinced that they work for the people and that they should do so as efficiently as possible. Otherwise there will be complaints from the population. And that population pays them through taxes.
That awareness is clearly not there in Thailand.
Must say that it personally does not bother me much, I am always present at the airport well in advance because whether I am waiting at home or at the airport, then rather at the airport. Then you may be waiting for 3 minutes or an hour in front of a closed counter, but then you will be one of the first to check in. Then you have almost 3 hours for passport control and shopping at SUvarnabhumi.
When I return to BKK, I try to get off the plane as quickly as possible and then quickly walk to passport control. Are you usually almost at the front of the queue and if my wife has been to NL then we can join the queue for Thai people.
On average it takes the civil servant less than a minute, usually only half a minute, but it is the people who don't have their affairs in order that slow things down. Arrival or departure card not filled in, or otherwise what ends. Just send Mi away and rejoin the back of the queue.
Usually the civil servant is friendly to me, but he/she can also have a bad day, we all have that sometimes.
I've always wondered about getting off the plane as quickly as possible.
You may be at the front of the row of your own aircraft, but you may also be at the back of the row of the previous aircraft.
Since planes arrive and depart all day, it will make little difference in terms of waiting time.
And when you have passed through immigration, you still have to wait for your suitcase, in my experience.