What was meant to be a smoother, tech-driven border experience has turned into a nightmare for many non-EU passengers arriving at or departing from Prague on 19 December. British tabloid The Sun and multiple social-media videos show snaking lines at Václav Havel Airport after the still-testing EU Entry/Exit System (EES) suffered another major outage on Friday morning.
Under the new regime, visa-exempt third-country nationals must enrol fingerprints and a facial image at a self-service kiosk before they reach Czech passport control. When the kiosks froze, Foreign Police officers were forced to capture biometrics manually at the desk – a process that more than triples transaction time. One Australian traveller posted that his family waited “nearly three hours” before passports were stamped; several missed their onward connection to Paris.
Travellers and corporate mobility planners looking to reduce the stress of Czech border procedures can lean on the expertise of VisaHQ, which tracks the latest EES roll-outs and can pre-arrange all necessary documentation for trips to Prague and beyond. Their dedicated Czechia portal (https://www.visahq.com/czech-republic/) offers real-time alerts, concierge services and up-to-date visa guidance to help passengers breeze through checkpoints once the system stabilises.
![Holiday Travellers Face Three-Hour Passport Queues in Prague as EES Glitches Spread Across Europe]()
Airlines told passengers they would be rebooked free of charge, but representatives from the Czech Airline Pilots Association warned that cascading delays could cause knock-on disruption to crew-duty rosters through the weekend peak. Airport management said extra staff had been deployed and promised software patches overnight, yet acknowledged that further slowdowns are possible if traffic surges exceed modelling assumptions.
The timing is awkward: the first big wave of Christmas-market visitors and returning Czech expatriates traditionally peaks on the final Friday before Christmas. Travel-management companies are advising corporate travellers to switch to Terminal 2 intra-Schengen routings where possible, or to schedule Monday departures to avoid the crunch.
For mobility managers, the episode is another reminder that digital border projects can carry significant transition risk. Companies relocating staff to Czechia in early 2026 may need to adjust arrival schedules, pre-book VIP assistance or allow additional days before critical onboarding dates until the EES stabilises.
Under the new regime, visa-exempt third-country nationals must enrol fingerprints and a facial image at a self-service kiosk before they reach Czech passport control. When the kiosks froze, Foreign Police officers were forced to capture biometrics manually at the desk – a process that more than triples transaction time. One Australian traveller posted that his family waited “nearly three hours” before passports were stamped; several missed their onward connection to Paris.
Travellers and corporate mobility planners looking to reduce the stress of Czech border procedures can lean on the expertise of VisaHQ, which tracks the latest EES roll-outs and can pre-arrange all necessary documentation for trips to Prague and beyond. Their dedicated Czechia portal (https://www.visahq.com/czech-republic/) offers real-time alerts, concierge services and up-to-date visa guidance to help passengers breeze through checkpoints once the system stabilises.
Airlines told passengers they would be rebooked free of charge, but representatives from the Czech Airline Pilots Association warned that cascading delays could cause knock-on disruption to crew-duty rosters through the weekend peak. Airport management said extra staff had been deployed and promised software patches overnight, yet acknowledged that further slowdowns are possible if traffic surges exceed modelling assumptions.
The timing is awkward: the first big wave of Christmas-market visitors and returning Czech expatriates traditionally peaks on the final Friday before Christmas. Travel-management companies are advising corporate travellers to switch to Terminal 2 intra-Schengen routings where possible, or to schedule Monday departures to avoid the crunch.
For mobility managers, the episode is another reminder that digital border projects can carry significant transition risk. Companies relocating staff to Czechia in early 2026 may need to adjust arrival schedules, pre-book VIP assistance or allow additional days before critical onboarding dates until the EES stabilises.
