Qantas MEL-HNL

[justinbrett]

Having used the "smart" gates back in late June, for a morning flight to Vancouver, I must say I was disappointed. Sure the line was only 5 or 6 deep, but the machines were malfunctioning that day and it took close to 20 minutes to clear emigration. I do recall there being an airport personnel yelling out destinations that were already boarding at the security line (including my destination) and that allowed me to cut ahead of a number of people.

I've cut queues many times at SYD be it for domestic or international flights. The key is to show the boarding as you go by. Fellow passengers won't be happy but it's not your fault that you've got a 30 minute connection!

-RooFlyer88

Morning flights are much busier as that's the peak time at SYD T1. I haven't had your experience with the smart gates and I've been through three times this year. You must have got them on a bad day.

Trival point - it's not emigration, whilst that's the opposite of the word immigration, it means to permanently leave your country of residence. It's generally just called passport control. I think historically it was called immigration because it was the department of immigration that ran the checks, there is no department of emigration. And strictly speaking entering the country on a tourist visa is also not immigration, but visas are run by the department... Hence why officially both are now called passport control.