 Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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All smooth going back home right now but terminal was getting busy.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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alti - dude, thanks we are about two hours away so we'll see, fingers crossed, we are a bit early at the moment, would be fab to get through easily as still 4 hours the other side for us.
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They aren't letting people move forward trains though.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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If you think you may be faced with a long wait in the terminal head to Au Calice for a nice lunch instead. In Calais centre, just before the town hall.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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sarah, I don't think this is anything unusual for the return from New Year. I remember trying to bring forward my return crossing when hubby had his accident and was unable to do so to a day that was suitable for his return home. They had no availability at all for the day I wanted, and were only able to offer me something two days later than I needed. I had to book a new ferry trip in the end at a higher cost (although insurers eventually refunded it).
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Hells Bells, no maybe not but it just goes to show you need to plan your timings very carefully, much later than we were there and we'd have been looking at a very long wait  It makes you wonder though about why ET take so many bookings when they can't cope with the volume? It's a fairly simple operation yet on peak weekends they grind to a halt, what are they doing? overbooking?
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sarah, possibly, but I suppose it only takes a technical fault at peak time to expose the problems and cause major delays. Our only real delay was a Christmas trip out in 2010 when there had been bad weather. We arrived close to midday to be told of a 4 hour delay and to go catch a ferry at 2pm which turned out not to be operating at the advised time. Our ferry left at 4pm which was the advised time of the rescheduled tunnel crossing. 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Hells Bells, I can see that but then why do they have the chaos on every single peak weekend? Surely they can't have so many technical problems, I think they must take far more bookings than they have capacity for. As for Flexiplus that's a joke when there's such a queue to even get in in the first place, can you imagine having paid around four times the standard price for Flexiplus only to queue anyway for hours on end?
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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I was on the 750 this morning and was perfect, no issues at all
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skimottaret, good news 
You really do have to plan carefully to avoid the worst of it. So we left at 7.00am from probably one of the closest resorts and took a quieter route and so had a good run up all the way with minimal stops arriving at 15.15, if we'd had a lie-in or leisurely breakfast or lunch then we would have paid for it with a three + hour delay.
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You know it makes sense.
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needs a totally reorganised car park too. i'd have torn up and binned a ticket if they'd given me one after I abandoned my car on the pedestrian crossing. serves them right for not letting me in the overflow carpark when the carpark was overflowing.
Mine was only 3hr35min from A20 to train, in the end. More parking rage than anything. Fortunately I'd put a pizza in the freezer on purpose, which went down well at 2:30am.
Anyway... saving up for DFDS next. ANyone know a good mortgage broker?
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Got in at the worst moment, ten past seven pm. It took us an hour and twenty minutes to get to the British passport control side. The momeny we got past it, the flexi plus kicked in - stopped for five minutes to pick up sandwiches and drinks, then drove straight on to the front of the next train . All in all much better than the same peak period last year...
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Poster: A snowHead
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Eurotunnel really should start being rather more honest with their customers. We arrived at 4.00 yesterday for our 5.20pm crossing and although busy through border controls we were able to sample the wonders of the terminal building (WH Smiths and the smelliest toilets in France) in good time to then sit and watch our booked crossing simply evaporate from their system.
We finally crossed an hour late with no explanation, not a disaster but after 9 hours driving and with another 2-3 ahead it's the lack of communication and uncertainty which really winds me up. Over the past decade we've seen this approach numerous times, acs mentioned above it appears they simply over-book peak periods and hope for the best, I guess customers don't really matter to monopolies 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Nick D, yet last week when I looked to change a crossing time in advance I was unable to, as trains were apparently full last Tuesday (NYE). The quietness of our train and the terminal suggested otherwise and we were on a train 1 hour earlier than booked. . When we experienced our delay a few years ago I complained an received a £50 voucher for a future crossing. FWIW, we usually book a lunchtime crossing outbound (as we are 5 hours drive from tunnel), and an early to mid-afternoon one on our return (2.30 ish), rarely have any delays, but I've now shot myself in the foot as sods law says there will be problems next time. I do also have to add that with the exception of Christmas we rarely travel at peak times.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Just queue for UKBA. Arrived 50mins before latest checkin but allocated booked crossing with no earlier availability.
Busy but not crazy - 30 min delay advised.
So far so good!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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30 mins from turning off motorway to parked at terminal. Our letter is next to be called - still apparently for the 12.20 crossing.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I guess customers don't really matter to monopolies
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Hardly a monopoly - there are plenty of other ways of crossing the channel.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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pam w, Clearly, one could sail or swim across, however to my knowledge Eurotunnel has a monopoly on sub sea shuttle services 
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Nick D, agree with you on that one!
We're on board and expecting an on time 12.20 departure.
Not a bad experience today but no way you could turn up 30 minutes before and get your booked crossing. I think the traffic will build as the day goes on so would recommend building in an extra hour in advance of your latest check in time.
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Just on the move bang on time
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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on the way out was slightly late, got waved through and metaphorically hand braked onto the train. which is why no update at time. on way back, arrived 2 hours early, slotted in booked train, was about an hour late. flying at half term
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I hate to say it, but we're all partly to blame for the over-crowding in terminal 
It is well established that they are flexible, so as well as the 3 or 4 train loads queuing to board and the 3 or 4 train loads waiting in the terminal, you have the extra 3 loads who have turned up early on spec. Hence capacity in terminal etc gets overloaded.
ET know this hence the txts at peak times about stick to arrival times. Once ET staff were on the bridge in Calais turning people away who were more than 2-hours early. They need to get better at managing early arrivals and departure times. This is not unique to ET look at the chaos at airports when several flights stack up.
That said - they should have the capacity to get people through quicker and slicker - particularly as ET is very rarely operating at the capacity it was designed for.
The UK border delays are outside ET's influence largely.
Given the numbers of people using it though, it must be offering something people want however bad it can be.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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The ferries do seem to have the check in and queue process much better organised, have better facilities, are cheaper and I do find the P and O customer service to be excellent - only 2 downsides is that it does take a bit longer (but how much really when you take into account getting to the tunnel early as you expect queue problems and that you are rested and properly fed to give it a hammering the other side) and occasionally it can get a bit bumpy (but people pay for that at Alton Towers)
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Just got off Eurotunnel at Folkestone - although unable to get on an earlier train due to them being fully booked my train left on time.
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Certainly have huge car parks to handle traffic. Don't think there are any more facilities.
Real down side to ferry crossing is having to put up with drunk chavs roaming the ship
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You know it makes sense.
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never seen drunk chavs. well not since duty free and the £1 ticket booze cruises went. in fact the last time I recall that was probably when I was 18 going over to france to get in the cheap booze on a bus trip, and we painted a wasted guy's face with duty free lipstick and made him walk thru customs like that. So about 1989ish. booze cruises now are all about grounding out the suspension, stocking up at Eastenders or teh Calais Beer and Wine shop... or Sainsubury's in one of the Calais Hypermarchés.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Plenty last May when we took a crossing
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Poster: A snowHead
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IME the delays are relatively rare, and limited to travelling at very busy times (though one does wonder why the customs posts don't have more lanes open at these times). 95% of my journeys run smoothly (in fact outbound is more like 99.9%) - eg. turn up 'around' (+/- 1h) my scheduled time, get on first train available, no need to visit terminal building (hence I've never seen the point in Felxiplus). I've only occasionally seen a scheduled train disappear from the board, and that's been related to 'technical issues'.
Coming back after the Xmas week, we booked a late crossing (22:20 I think) and I was concerned about queues because of the busy time, but we turned up about 21:30, were offered an earlier crossing (which I didn't take as kids needed a toilet/food stop), straight though customs with no queue - the UK border lady told me we timed it well as the queues had just cleared.
So are late crossings the way forward for peak days, or was I just lucky? My concern being there was supposedly only one more high vehicle train that day, so if we had been delayed it might have been an overnight stop
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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having to put up with drunk chavs roaming the ship
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just generally dealing with the great British public on the ferries can be pretty awful! We generally go into the Bistro or whatever its latest name is and just emerge at the very last minute and that is a bit safer. But we didn't do that when we had three kids in tow years ago. We tend to only use the tunnel in the depths of winter when we want to get as close to Les Gets as we can before dark, the rest of the time we would always choose the ferry.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Train stopped in tunnel 2 hours delay!!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I got the train back from Bourg to St Pancras last night and no problems at all, even slept okay.
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I'm hoping the trains from 0600 - 0750 will be fairly empty so I can grab an earlier crossing. Can't see that many idiots prepared to drive all night 
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Can't see that many idiots prepared to drive all night
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Roy Orbison might
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Quote:
Can't see that many idiots prepared to drive all night
Roy Orbison might
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With those dark glasses he'd probably end up in a collision.
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FAQ
That's why the Perdrix have those pichets of wine by the till 
