The "Direction de la Police aux Frontières" (head of French Border Police) and Groupe ADP have joined forces to draw up a monthly report on the waiting times encountered by passengers at the various border control points at Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly Airports.
General trend observed in February 2023:
For the record, the maximum waiting times at the Border Police in airports, targeted by the French Prime Minister - during the inter-ministerial council on tourism on 26th July 2017 -, are 30 minutes for European nationals and 45 minutes for non-Europeans.
- At Paris-Charles de Gaulle: out of nearly 2.5 million passengers on international flights [1], 83% waited less than 10 minutes, 97% less than 30 minutes and 99% less than 45 minutes.
- At Paris-Orly: out of nearly 754,800 passengers on international flights, 85% waited less than 10 minutes, 99% less than 30 minutes and 99% less than 45 minutes.
Events resulting in waiting times of over 30 minutes [2]:
At Paris-Charles de Gaulle /
Week 1: 20 events impacting approximately 5,400 passengers, with an average waiting time of 50 minutes.
Week 2: 41 events with an impact on approximately 10,800 passengers, with an average waiting time of 45 minutes.
Week 3: 35 events with an impact on approximately 15,800 passengers, with an average waiting time of 45 minutes.
Week 4: 34 events affecting around 12,400 passengers, with an average waiting time of 45 minutes.
At Paris-Orly /
Week 1: 2 events affecting around 240 passengers, with an average waiting time of 40 minutes.
Week 2: 1 event affecting approximately 860 passengers, with an average waiting time of 40 minutes.
Week 3: 5 events affecting approximately 1,250 passengers, with an average waiting time of 40 minutes.
Week 4: 6 events affecting approximately 1,000 passengers, with an average waiting time of 50 minutes.
Flashbacks at some events:
On Monday 6th February, at departures from Terminal CDG 2B, from 6.50 pm, breakdown of the Ministry of the Interior's IT tool: around 150 passengers waited for an hour, following a loss of access with the Ministry of the Interior's file recognition tool, an incident that lasted for more than an hour and a half. The switch to manual controls and the reinforcement of three police officers from terminal 2E allowed the flow to be reduced from 8pm.
On Monday 13th February, at departures from Terminal CDG 2E, from 8:00 am, Border Police manpower: approximately 1,000 passengers waited for an hour, with police officers being mobilized for control missions (stops at the gates, search cards, non-admission, and escorts).
On Friday 17th February, at Orly 4, at 11:00 am, the flight schedule drifted: more than 500 passengers waited for about an hour. PAF agents were mobilized on several external missions and five flights had their arrival times changed, which greatly modified the presentation curves initially planned.
Monday 20th February / Tuesday 21st February / Wednesday 22nd February morning, arrivals at Orly 4: these three mornings were marked by large volumes of passengers, with the mobilization of several police officers on control missions (apprehensions at the departure lounge, search sheets, non-admission and escorts). The choice was made to prioritize the number of police officers on departures, so as not to penalize the punctuality of these flights.
Saturday 25thj February 2023, arrivals at CDG 2E terminal, between 6.30am and 7.40am, a weekend back from holiday: more than a thousand passengers waited for an hour at arrivals, in a context of heavy traffic where departure controls were prioritized so as not to see the flight schedule drift. The usual configuration of the PARAFE airlocks at Terminal 2E arrivals - five dedicated to US/Canada/Great Britain passengers and five dedicated to European nationals - was not adapted to a higher than usual proportion of European passengers (many French passengers returning from holidays in the USA). One of the ten airlocks was also out of order.
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The Border Police launches a recruitment plan for contractual and administrative staff
The Border Police has launched a recruitment program for 255 contractual and administrative staff at Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly for border control missions, to strengthen border police staff, particularly in view of the major summer departures and upcoming international and sporting events.
Groupe ADP is mobilizing the Aérowork platform to promote these new opportunities within the national police force. Recruitment is underway and on track to meet targets before the summer.
All jobs are available on https://www.aerowork.fr/
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Details of monthly results for February 2023 regarding Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly:
Methodology: real time data from counting sensors
Since 2019, Groupe ADP has deployed tools to monitor and control passenger flows and waiting times. In particular, sensors allowing the number of passengers to be counted in real time in a queue have been deployed to equip the border crossing and safety control areas of Paris Airports. This is a real-time measurement tool that is automatically updated every five seconds.
It counts the number of passengers in a queue by measuring how long the last person to leave the queue has been waiting. Between 80 and 200 sensors are needed to cover an area, depending on its size. The data is fed into an operational performance monitoring tool that analyses what has happened in an operational day. It is the data extracted from these sensors that is used to set up this barometer.
Special case of CDG Terminal 1: this terminal has recently been reopened and is not yet fully equipped with waiting time monitoring tools. The deployment will be finalised by the summer and the results for Terminal 1 will thus be integrated into the barometer.
[1] Passengers who crossed the border on departure, in transit or on arrival at Paris-Charles de Gaulle or Paris-Orly are taken into account (therefore, not passengers on domestic or Schengen flights).
[2] Events impacting more than 50 passengers are included. Two occurrences must be separated by 20 minutes, otherwise only one event is counted.
