EU Entry-Exit Biometric System Now Operational in Most Member States

Portugal and Italy do not plan on exempting British nationals from Europe's new fingerprinting and facial scanning checks, the European Commission confirmed. The European Commission stated that Portuguese and Italian authorities confirmed they do not intend to exempt any nationality from the Entry-Exit System.

Greece has effectively suspended biometric checks at its borders for British citizens until September.

The European Commission is in contact with Greece to clarify the situation and recall the existing rules. Those rules allow checks to be suspended for short periods at specific border crossings in exceptional circumstances but do not allow blanket exemptions for nationals of specific third countries and for an extended period of time.

The European Commission was also in contact with Portugal and Italy, as with all Member States, on the implementation of the EES.

The European Commission insists the system has mainly been working well. The Entry-Exit System was first introduced in October 2025. It was meant to become fully operational on 10 April. The EES rollout occurred last month relative to early May 2026.

The EES requires most short-term visitors from outside the EU and European Economic Area to register biometric data each time they enter or leave the Schengen free travel zone. The Schengen free travel zone includes 25 of the EU's 27 member states plus Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein and Switzerland. The rollout of the Entry-Exit System has caused long queues at some European airports.

More than 100 people missed their EasyJet flight to Manchester from Milan's Linate airport after being stuck in passport queues. Passengers due to travel with Ryanair from Milan Bergamo airport to Manchester missed their flight due to passport control problems. Alicante Airport was pushed to breaking point by the EES change.

Michelle Maguire, 38, travelling home from Malaga to Liverpool, arrived home 24 hours late and was left £1,000 out of pocket. Stuart MacLennan, 49, from Oban in Scotland, experienced a three-and-a-half hour delay for those with children under 12 on his flight from Malaga to Glasgow.

Dylan Thomas, 23, an HR associate from Lincolnshire, described his return journey from Brussels on the Eurostar as ridiculous because approximately 20 machines had plastic wrapping and could not be used, with only one person manually checking everyone.

Dave Giles, 47, an IT manager from Raunds in Northamptonshire, missed his flight home on 12 April from Copenhagen. Dave Giles encountered a queue of probably 80 to 100 people with only three kiosks checking passports, after which one kiosk closed. Dave Giles paid over £2,000 for replacement flights, accommodation for the night, and extra parking charges at Stansted.

British tourism was worth £3 billion to Greece. Seamus McCauley said European countries reliant on tourism could have no choice but to follow Greece's move to suspend the EES. Seamus McCauley said: "Countries are not going to sit back and let Greece take their trade because they won't face EES delays at airports.

Seamus McCauley described the rollout of the system as a fiasco. Neil McMahon said: "Governments are attempting to roll out a half-baked IT system in the middle of the busiest travel season. Passengers are paying the price, being forced to endure hours-long passport control queues and in some cases missing flights.

Airlines have cut 13,000 flights globally for May, equivalent to 1% of flights for that period.