Smart Gate - how popular is it?

[Verde]

Used SmartGate for the first time last week in Melb , what a breeze to get through . The delay for me was waiting for the damn bags , otherwise would have got through in around 20 mins.

How many gates did they have going?

I flew in to MEL last July (QF LAX-MEL) and the gates were massively overwhelmed, only 3 or 4 operating I think and huge queues. It certainly took the longest I've ever had returning to Australia to get through (including pre-smart gates).

It was significantly worse than my BNE/SYD experiences, so much so that I decided I was always going to avoid flying in to MEL int'l in the future. I'm quite curious to know if I had an unusually poor experience compared to the norm at MEL arrivals.

 

[Warks]

Used it several times going to NZ last year and then went with the family in September - I was busy showing off to Mrs Warks how easy it was until we put the kids' passports through...

... off to the desk. Luckily it was a short queue. I didn't see any sign that under-18s can't use it. I may have been sign blinded though.

 

[markis10]

Used it several times going to NZ last year and then went with the family in September - I was busy showing off to Mrs Warks how easy it was until we put the kids' passports through...

... off to the desk. Luckily it was a short queue. I didn't see any sign that under-18s can't use it. I may have been sign blinded though.

Its under 16s

Currently, there are some ePassport holders that cannot use SmartGate including:

• those aged under 16 years
• Australian and New Zealand ePassport holders travelling on military orders.

 

[MissBurrill]

Currently, there are some ePassport holders that cannot use SmartGate including:

• Australian and New Zealand ePassport holders travelling on military orders.

I've found customs and quarantine staff enjoy saying welcome home and genuinely care that I've returned home safely when travelling this way.

 

[Mrmaxwell]

I returned to SYD at 18.30 last week and the airport was dead - about 3 people lining up from my flight so no need to use smartgate as the bored customs officers were waving us over begging to serve us!

Why can't all flights arrive at this time....I guess then it wouldn't be so dead right?

 

[drewbles]

They had gone when I came through back in November ... this included the one up near the QF/NZ/EK lounges.

Noticed the same. Shame really, was nice wandering direct from plane to smartgate (only a minor inconvenience, but still).

Just hope AU gets up to date soon and uses it outbound like AKL though. So much easier (i've had 100% success with my photo being taken, and that's me having to remove my specs).

 

[Simsy85]

You obviously weren't buying Duty Free grog from JR Duty arguing the price on the posters didn't match the shelves (we got our discount)

really? nah bought my smokes in Bali ($1 a pack) and already have enough booze - at that time of night, I just want to get home.

 

[JohnK]

Love the comments about lightning fast, etc. It is great if you are the first one there and no one else in sight.

Arrived in BNE yesterday morning. It was a zoo. Whoever thought it was a good idea having 2 flights from USA, QF52 and some other flights from Asia as well as some flights from the Eastern islands arrive at the same time has rocks in their head.

The queues at Smartgate kiosks to get receipt were at least 7-8 deep when I got there yesterday morning. And then the main queue to get to the scanners was 40-50 deep. I did not time it to see how long it took but it was slow and more than likely quicker than normal immigration queues anyway.

A number of people were getting rejected and there was an assistance queue but that seemed fairly busy as well.

I would hate to see what happens when everyone is using chipped passports in a few years time.

. No NZ trips for you then. They don't have stamps

Just ask for a stamp.

 

[Scarlett]

Smart gate is a great idea - except when arriving on JQ and they haven't apparently sent whatever pax info they were supposed to. Everyone from that flight was being rejected by smartgate. Made the rejection queue longer than if we'd just joined the normal queue.
Another tick for the orange cancer...

 

[Bolthead]

Where have I been the last couple of years... I normally fly 4-5 overseas trip per year and have never seen signs to a smart gate, or people lining up on a so called smart gate. After reading through this whole tread I was was starting to think that I was either on drugs or still asleep when arriving back to Sydney. My only excuse for my ignorance is that I still have an old passport and won't have a new 'e' passport until 2014... Can't wait!!

 

[MiLK_MaN]

If there is minimal queue in the normal customs lines, then I don't even bother with smart gate.

I think I'm about 2 from 7 with a successful face recognition, one of those was in Wellington NZ. Having lost about 34kgs since my passport photo was taken, it must be throwing it out.

 

[grubbidok]

I love it. Or loved it. It stopped working for me and kept asking me to see staff. Customs staff told me not to bother as it will never let me through any more as it turns out I have very similar details to some unsavoury characters who need to be kept an eye on.

 

[cove]

Mrscove must have a secret evil twin too. Hers failed last week. I just sail thru smart gate but I dropped the card and it landed at my feet. Now that's a long way down when you have been in planes for 24 hours. Not bothering to pick it up put me into a second screening before I could escape to the outside world and our waiting limo driver.

 

[Fantic125]

After having no issues using it with my previous passport, Sunday morning was a fail for me with the new passport. Rejected and sent over to assistance where they sent me through.

Hopefully this is only a once off...

 

[Hvr]

.

I think I'm about 2 from 7 with a successful face recognition, one of those was in Wellington NZ. Having lost about 34kgs since my passport photo was taken, it must be throwing it out.

I've not had any problems since I lost about 40 kg. I just stare hard at the camera and remain very still. Touch wood it's worked every time.

 

[dot]

If there is minimal queue in the normal customs lines, then I don't even bother with smart gate.

I think I'm about 2 from 7 with a successful face recognition, one of those was in Wellington NZ. Having lost about 34kgs since my passport photo was taken, it must be throwing it out.

Loosing/gaining weight, facial hair, hair styles, tan etc should not have an effect on the reliability of smartgate's facial recognition since the facial recognition is based on measurements that typically don't change such as your height, distance between your eyes, nose, mouth, chin etc - if you had major facial reconstruction surgery, then I would expect Smartgate to have a problem, but not with something like loosing weight. I would also expect significant variance in your height (by wearing flats one time, then 6" heals the next time) would cause Smartgate to question the accuracy of the recognition and bounce you to the manual processing line.

 

[ajw373]

Loosing/gaining weight, facial hair, hair styles, tan etc should not have an effect on the reliability of smartgate's facial recognition since the facial recognition is based on measurements that typically don't change such as your height, distance between your eyes, nose, mouth, chin etc - if you had major facial reconstruction surgery, then I would expect Smartgate to have a problem, but not with something like loosing weight. I would also expect significant variance in your height (by wearing flats one time, then 6" heals the next time) would cause Smartgate to question the accuracy of the recognition and bounce you to the manual processing line.

Height is not compared as your passport and the system has no idea what so ever how high you are. The only information that it compares to is what is on your passport picture, so basically your head.

The only time height becomes an issue is in relation to which camera to look into at the smart gate, but as mentioned it isn't to compare just to get the best shot of your head to compare with what is on the passport.

 

[jujay]

Used this for the first time yesterday and it was great - queues in the regular lines were enormous. Flew through the smart gates! My mum had problems getting through, i suspect because she was wearing glasses but isn't wearing them in her passport pic.

 

[Fruitcake]

My mum had problems getting through, i suspect because she was wearing glasses but isn't wearing them in her passport pic.

I have a high-tech way to get around this: I take off my glasses when using SmartGate .

 

[totd]

Used this for the first time yesterday and it was great - queues in the regular lines were enormous. Flew through the smart gates! My mum had problems getting through, i suspect because she was wearing glasses but isn't wearing them in her passport pic.

Don't they tell you to take off glasses? It's an easy enough mistake to make, though, I guess. Last passport photo I had done, I needed a friendly reminder from the photographer.