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Von der
Leyen admits ‘technical problems’ with new EU airport border checks
Airlines
blame the Entry/Exit System for hours-long queues and missed connecting
flights.
July 3,
2026 6:32 pm CET
By
Tommaso Lecca
The EU’s
new digital Entry/Exit System is experiencing “technical problems,” European
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen acknowledged on Friday.
“We are
working with the member states [so] that the technical problems are being
solved,” von der Leyen said at a press conference in Cork, Ireland.
The EES
has been a subject of concern since its gradual rollout last year, but the
problems have become more acute as air traffic picks up during Europe’s peak
summer travel season.
Airports
and airlines have blamed the new border control system — which requires
travelers from non-EU countries to register their biometric data — for
hours-long queues, operational disruption and missed connecting flights.
“There’s
still quite a lot of work to do to have these technical issues solved together
with the member states,” von der Leyen said.
The
comments mark a shift in tone from the Commission, which had downplayed
disruption linked to the EES. “In most EU airports, this impact is indeed
limited,” Markus Lammert, the Commission’s spokesperson for internal affairs,
said Wednesday.
The
Commission said earlier this year that registering an entry or exit typically
takes about 70 seconds.
The
aviation industry sees things very differently.
Since the
EES became mandatory, “waiting times at border control have increased
significantly, now reaching up to five hours during peak traffic periods,”
airport lobby ACI Europe and airline groups IATA and Airlines for Europe wrote
in an open letter to von der Leyen on Wednesday.
“These
delays are impacting millions of passengers entering the Schengen Area … At the
same time, airports and airlines are experiencing growing operational
disruption, including flight delays, missed connections and increasing pressure
on frontline staff,” the three organizations wrote.
They
urged the Commission to give countries greater flexibility “to completely
suspend EES” where necessary, “at least throughout July and August.”
Under the
EES, travelers from non-EU countries such as the U.K. and the U.S. must
register their fingerprints and a facial image the first time they enter the
bloc for a short stay.
The
system is designed to combat overstays and the use of fraudulent travel
documents by replacing passport stamps with a digital record. Registration can
be accelerated through self-service kiosks or dedicated pre-registration apps.
However,
when the system became mandatory on April 10, border officers were still
manually entering data at major hubs such as Rome's Fiumicino Airport. So far,
only Sweden and Portugal have activated the apps intended to speed up passenger
processing.
Several
airports and ports have temporarily suspended biometric data collection during
peak travel periods to ease congestion.
The EES
“did not change the legal frame about rules of entering and exiting the EU; it
just creates transparency about abiding to the rules,” von der Leyen said in
Cork.
The
Commission has defended the system by pointing to its security benefits.
Between its original launch in October last year and April, “over 700 persons
were identified as posing a security risk to Europe,” it said.
Irish
Minister for Home Affairs Jim O’Callaghan said those figures have since risen
to “approximately a thousand people,” adding that around 110 million passengers
have passed through EES checks since the system's introduction.
“It is
effective in terms of protecting European Union security,” O’Callaghan said.
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