Slot coordinator expects crowds, long lines at Schiphol in coming days

Travelers can expect extremely long queues at Schiphol in the coming days. Airlines can not yet comply with the restrictions Schiphol imposed well enough to prevent long lines. Slot coordinator ACNL, therefore, expects crowds like on Monday, when a shortage of security personnel resulted in people queueing for hours and many travelers missing their flights.

Airport Coordination Netherlands (ACNL) expects the measures to have more effect in the course of next week. “At such short notice, it is difficult to reduce capacity. The coming days must be bridged. Realistically, there will be long queues outside again in the coming days,” said director Hugo Thomassen. He asked Schiphol itself to express concrete expectations. BARIN, the interest group for airlines active in the Netherlands, said it expects a lot of crowds in the coming days.

This week, ACNL informed 45 airlines how much they need to reduce their departing passengers each day. The airlines are figuring out how to achieve that, will coordinate with the slot coordinator, and then communicate this to travelers. Thomassen has already received an answer from about ten companies, “which is quite fast.”

According to him, airlines are taking “wide-ranging” measures to meet the contraction, such as canceling flights and limiting ticket sales. “We heard disappointment from companies that they have to reduce their capacity again, but concrete proposals also came to us fairly quickly. There is a sense of reality.” Thomassen thinks he can quickly agree to the companies’ plans.

Due to the crowds and staff shortages, Schiphol asked airlines to reduce the number of daily departing passengers by an average of 18 percent until at least the end of October. The airport has fewer available security guards than hoped.

Schiphol acknowledged that coping with the crowds would be a challenge, especially in the coming days. The airport urged airlines first to tackle the short-term passenger flows because there is insufficient staff. Travelers should expect queues. Schiphol advised travelers to arrive on time, but no earlier than four hours before their flight departs.

The crowds on Thursday are manageable, according to a Schipol spokesperson. Travelers don’t have to queue outside. According to the spokesperson, the average waiting time is one hour.

In the first week since the Consumentenbond opened its missed flights reporting point, the consumers’ association already received 140 reports. This concerns people who missed their flight in September due to excessively long queues.

Schiphol offered to compensate passengers who missed their flights due to the crowds between April 23 and August 12. The Consumentenbond wants that regulation expanded and is already discussing it with the airport.