How long to leave between your international and domestic flight in Athens

This is the single most common way we see a Greek holiday start badly, and it has got worse this year. You land in Athens from London or New York, you have a domestic flight to Santorini or Crete a couple of hours later, and you assume that is plenty. It used to be. Since the new biometric border system came in it often is not.

What changed

Every traveller on a non EU passport is now registered at the border with a passport scan, four fingerprints and a facial image. The first registration takes around five minutes per person, and it applies to British, American, Canadian and Australian passports among others. Athens has been running the full system since the end of March. The airport itself now advises arriving two and a half hours before departure, which tells you what the operators expect.

What that means in a queue

Waits at passport control of thirty to sixty minutes are normal at peak arrival times, roughly double what the same hour looked like last summer, and at the worst moments this June queues of well over two hours were reported. Several airlines have had flights disrupted by it. The good news, and it is real, is that this is a one off. Once your biometrics are on file the next entry is quick.

The number to use

Domestic Greek flights sit inside the Schengen area, so arriving from outside it you must clear border control before you can take one. Airline minimum connection times do not account for a two hour queue. On a single ticket leave three hours, and know that if you miss it the airline must rebook you. On two separate tickets, which is what most people have when the cheap long haul fare and the island flight were booked apart, do not attempt a same day connection at all. Nobody owes you anything and you buy a new ticket.

The version we book most often is a night in Athens on the way in. It removes the risk completely, it fixes the jet lag, and it gives you an evening in a city most people skip entirely on their way to the islands.