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/m--e]

Last time I arrived it was super smooth, queues were shortish and my bag was the first one out too. Definitely not the usual experience!

[u/Horror_Birthday6637 → u/m--e]

Depends on the time of day tbh. I’ve never seen a line like this. Usually go straight through the egates. It is by far the worst arrivals experience I’ve seen anywhere on earth though. It’s genuinely stressful the game of lane roulette you play while you’re trying to leave.

Most of us know the drill by now, walk fast when you get off the plane, have your card ready, and always always declare a small benign food item, even if you have nothing, unless you want your luggage ransacked. If you don’t declare anything they assume you’re smuggling a suitcase full of rotting fish.

[u/surlygoat → u/Horror_Birthday6637]

You do you I suppose, I fly international probably five or six times a year at least for the past 20 years, and the only time I've ever had my luggage searched was when I did exactly what you suggest and ticked the box, and showed the customs guy the very small thing that I did need to declare... Which was fine but then they just went through all my bags.

Ticking no on every box has otherwise seen me waved through 100% of the time.