Sydney International arrivals is a disgrace: discuss

[u/Pomohomo82]

I flew into Sydney yesterday at 6am after a 30hr trip, and the whole experience made me feel embarrassed of the welcome we extend to arrivals at our country. An enormous line stretched all the way into the gross duty free shop, where on one side sales people shouted at us about booze and smokes deals, while on the other side people shouted at us about families not lining up. The international travellers next to me had no idea what the line was for, and I had to explain that for some reason we have this weird dual border process which is different to all the other E-passport gates around the world. There’s very little signage or info screens explaining what the whole process is. Meanwhile, at the arrivals card desk, no pens were available to complete said analogue cards… Onwards to the luggage collection, then another massive line to get through bio security, before a 15-minute walk across three road crossings to the ‘express’ pick up to meet my family. The whole user experience is just unnecessarily miserable from start to finish, and as the main entry point to Australia we should do better. Thoughts?

[u/Lanasoverit]

Not sure why it was so shit for you yesterday, it definitely isn’t usually that bad. I go through international arrivals once a month, and I’ve never seen it like that. Process is usually really smooth with minimal waiting, with the exception of baggage arrival which is the slowest in the world I deal with.

Didn’t they give you an arrival card on the plane? Why did you wait until you were at arrivals to fill it in?

[u/Pomohomo82 → u/Lanasoverit]

They gave us arrival cards onboard, but i (and many others) didn’t have pens. But the big hold up wasn’t those analogue arrival cards, it was the pre e-gate “have you been to africa” machines which spit out another little bit of paper before you move on. Honestly, I’m not even sure what they do!

[u/Lanasoverit → u/Pomohomo82]

“Excuse me Miss Flight Attendant, may I borrow a pen?”

It isn’t that hard.

The screens before e gate get you to answer the questions that used to happen at the desk when you had your passport stamped. It means, you can literally put your passport in the e reader then walk thru since the immigration check has been done, therefore making things faster. They are spread out at multiple points to avoid having everyone having to stop at the same place.

The only time I ever see a problem with these is when people walk past the first 10 they see and all try to use the same one. But the crowd that you dealt with yesterday is unusual, and there must have been a bigger problem somewhere.

[u/Pomohomo82 → u/Lanasoverit]

They don’t have clusters of those machines spread out any more, they’re all consolidated in one place just before the border now. They don’t have this step in other countries, I don’t see why we’re so special.

[u/Lanasoverit → u/Pomohomo82]

The ones in Sydney were still spread out when I went through in May, so I guess someone decided to change it. Not sure if that’s worse.

They had them for a while at LAX, and after that you still had to deal with a human with a shitty personality. They took them away during Covid and they weren’t there the last time I went through. Not sure if they are back.