The bizarre British Airways arrivals experience at Manchester Terminal 2
In October 2025, British Airways moved into the expanded / renovated Terminal 2 at Manchester Airport.
The dream was that all of the problems which have plagued flying to and from Manchester for years would vanish and it would become one big happy place.
It didn’t quite work out that way.
Last week I went up to Manchester and got to see the odd new British Airways set-up for myself.
The problem is that Terminal 2 was not built to handle segregated domestic arrivals. Arriving domestic passengers were to mix with arriving international passengers before exiting via a different channel because there is no immigration check.
The plan, as I understand it, was that arriving passengers would queue at the jetbridge to undergo a biometric facial scan. This scan would allow them to exit the terminal via a domestic channel in the immigration area.
The problem is that both British Airways and easyJet have decided that, with potentially up to 235 passengers on an easyJet A321neo, it is physically impossible to scan all arriving passengers in any sensible time frame.
(Ryanair has remained as the sole occupier of Terminal 3 so is not impacted by this. Aurigny and Loganair use smaller aircraft which means the biometric route is manageable. I am not sure what Aer Lingus is doing.)
Landing in Manchester? This is how it goes
This is how my trip unfolded last week.
11.06am – British Airways aircraft pulls up at a jetbridge, to give passengers a false sense of security
11.12am – I head down the jetbridge:
But what’s this I see through the glass?
Instead of entering the terminal, I am sent down some stairs:
…. where I walk past my aircraft:
…. and jump on a bus:
If it is raining, you will get wet walking from the stairs to the bus. Luckily, this is Manchester. Oh hang on ….
11.13am – 11.18am – Bus goes nowhere. Whilst there are three buses provided, I hear the ground staff saying that they are not told how many passenger are on the aircraft. This means they cannot split them equally between each bus and are forced to fill the first one to capacity, just in case.
11.24am – Bus arrives at UK Arrivals
By ‘UK Arrivals’, I mean that you are driven to a strange corner of the airport which is not normally used by the public:
…. where you enter the terminal:
Heathrow Terminal 5 this is not:
and
11.26am – 14 minutes after landing, which apparently is pretty good going under this system, I emerge in an area with a baggage carousel:
The only upside is that, if you are getting a train or tram into Manchester city centre, you are at the right part of Terminal 2 to head up to the skywalk. It is still quite a walk to the station though.
I should say that some elements of this system are only temporary. A new bus drop-off point is being created which will remove the need to go down the corridors I show above.
However, bussing will be permanent.
Transit passenger?
I accept that few people transit in Manchester. If you do, however, you seem to be stuck under this system. As far as I can tell, you need to head into the departure hall and re-enter via the main security lanes. You cannot transfer internally.
Departing Manchester?
The good news is that departing is a classier experience. You head through Terminal 2 in the normal way, with the only difference (as a domestic passenger) being that a biometric scan is taken which is matched up at the boarding gate. No busses are involved!
Conclusion
Even by the standards of Manchester Airport, the failure to build a sensible arrivals route for domestic passengers is bizarre.
For British Airways passengers, the buses are never going away. At some point in 2026 you may find yourself dropped somewhere which doesn’t look like it requires a hard hat to enter, but that’s as good as it’s going to get.