London Stansted Airport Reviews 

Despite me contacting the airport within minutes of making an error on booking parking dates they refused to refund me making me pay twice for the parking. So for a four day trip it has cost me £303 in parking, the Stanstead customer service team despite me attempting to explain my error are just rigidly applying policy. The airport itself was chaos with security being rude and ignorant, they delayed us all so long with the security checks that we had to run to make the flight. Then add insult to injury we were delayed an hour, the pilot explained the Stanstead ground crew neglected to give vital information in time for the control tower this meant we missed out take off slot and had to wait a further hour. This is the first time I have flown from Stanstead and it’s the worst airport I’ve flown from, you are treated like cattle not customers and are seen as an irritant to the people that work there, add this to the fact I feel I have been mugged over parking leaves a very bitter taste. I’m really disappointed that I have a further trip from Stanstead in October. I will avoid this airport if I can in the future.

Flying from Stanstead this evening and had the worst experience of any UK airport, due to the abrupt and rude manner of security staff at the baggage check queues.

One particular short overweight bald male, was shouting orders to passengers as they tried to load the scanner trays.

I was ordered to remove my shoes and was unsure what lane to be go to. I received the instruction of ‘come on it isn’t difficult ‘

Customer care goes a long way whilst travelling through an airport you are unsure of, which several of your security staff lacked from the outset and were plain rude and bordering on aggressive. Never again will I travel through this airport

Stansted security are disgraceful. Don't have a clue what manners are. The security area is badly organised, where folk are treated like cattle. Massive queues and obnoxious staff

Absolutely terrible experience. My flight was delayed for several hours, just like many others, and the airport staff provided almost no information or support. It felt like nobody cared about the passengers stuck waiting.
The so-called free Wi-Fi only works for two hours and is extremely slow, practically useless when you’re forced to spend hours in the terminal. After security there’s no smoking area, not even a place to get some fresh air — you’re completely trapped inside.
The seating is uncomfortable, overcrowded, and the whole atmosphere is chaotic. Honestly, there’s nothing good to say about this airport. One of the worst travel experiences I’ve ever had.

A five star rating for last minute need for Airport Assistance for my husband coming back from France. Airport in Brive provided wheelchair assistance within seconds and organised same at Stansted. Stansted matched this efficiency, meeting us at the airplane’s steps with a minibus to the terminal, transferred immediately to a wheel chair, whizzed through passport control, baggage collection and pushed all the way to car at Hampton by Hilton. Thank you for making a difficult day so easy. All the staff we met were cheerful and couldn’t have been more helpful.

I would give less than 1 star if I could. Airport staff are rude and badly trained. The airport is over capacity and can’t cope with the numbers going through. A really horrible experience

Monetarised everything, expensive even to drop someone off. Surprised not charging for air. Only reason writing this review as an ad popped up for this airport in my outlook.
On return from greece most of the auto passport boths were not working. The hall was packed, 2 hrs to get through.. Awful awful experience. Never using this airport again, as bad as Dalaman.

Date approx.

Just travelled from Stansted airport and paid for fast track through security. After passing through the entrance I noticed signs that the old rules about limiting and removing both liquids and electronics applied. I queried that as I had travelled from Stansted in May and June of this year and that had not been the case. I was informed fast track did not have the ‘new’ machine although it was being used in standard security there.
Consequently the situation was chaotic. It appeared no passenger was prepared for this and I had to give up several items which would not fit in their little plastic bag.
In my view this situation should have been made clear when selling the fast track option. If it had I would not have purchased it.
Do not waste money on fast track at Standard unless you enjoy chaos and discourtesy.

UK Border force far too slow for families.

Ruined the end of the holiday and made us not want to travel again.

A nearly 2 hour wait with young kids. Everyone in the queue was miserable.

No toilets, no water, no breaks... People changing nappies and breast feeding on the sidelines. Total disgrace

It’s unfortunate that I’ve had to come to social media however Stansted Airport, you are really showing an unfortunate side of little respect for the elderly disabled and generally bad customer service…. In July, Stansted Airport disability service put my mother and my family on the wrong plane…… yes they put us on the wrong plane to Italy instead of Turkey. We lost two days of our 7 day holiday because of this. And we all know that seven days is the minimum to enjoy your holiday. Because of this, we lost out of time on our holiday we also lost the reserved wheelchair that we had hired, a booked activity which was nonrefundable , and had to repay for a shuttle bus, food when travelling which if we were at our fully inclusive hotel, we would not have had to spend! Anyway, fast forward to me emailing customer service who has not acknowledged the stress they put my disabled mother through and has not acknowledged her disability or any of the issues that I raised that she experienced while going through this, due to your error and consider considering the cost of the holiday, Lauren from customer service thought it was OKAY to offer a… and I quote a kind gesture of £100……. Reading the comments today I can see a lot about how people are treated but I must say treating disabled, elderly pensioners poorly is a low. I have sent an email to customer service today. Let’s see if, whoever picks this up has more compassion for the old, disabled and vulnerable!

Avoid this airport if you can, especially if travelling with young children. Security stuff are absolute brain dead gestapo. Searched my 2 year old for 5 minutes, got him scared eventually. Then scanned every baby food and drink item manually after it passed the scanner already which takes another 20 minutes. For what reason exactly? Finally they confiscated child allergy relief medicine which is sold over the counter just to say go and buy the same in the airport Boots after security, so i had to pay twice for the same item + airport premium as well. Last time i travelled they confiscated a jar of baby Sudocrem using the same excuse. No airport in the world i ever used harasses people with children with such vigor for no reason adding unnecessary stress to families.

Landed at 11:25...got my luggage at 12....Just fire some useless overpaid managers and get more ordinary workers/luggage handlers....and learn what organised and efficient means....

Stansted Airport serviced by the "Scamsted" Express. They mislead you by requiring you to have a special ticket even though they advertise elsewhere that you can "pay by phone". You'd think this means you can use contactless or card like the rest of London transportation, but it doesn't.

They have a team of officers right at the airport to charge you £75 because they know it's too late for you and you can't fight it because you'll miss your flight. It's a scummy system designed to scam people out of their money for not knowing.

Definitely experienced the 1 star service with Stansted Airport staff, logic has left the group chat, no idea what inflated salaried individual with clearly no concept of basic math logic look at a 20x20cm zippy bag would be adequate to accommodate the “1000ml liquid” allowance. Seems Stansted and other London airports have chosen to ignore the current crisis with over following landfills, possible tons of discarded passages waste being dumped daily because it doesn’t fit in the required zippy bag, would a 30x30cm really make your job that hard, or pose a risk to air safety???? Asking for a friend, its clear, there is no logic available in your group chat!!!

I’m very disappointed with the airport's policies and facilities. First, I strongly disagree with the fact that passengers are required to pay for pick-ups and drop-offs. Most airports allow at least 15 minutes free for this, but here, there’s no such grace period. It's extremely unfriendly and feels like a cash grab. Even worse, the airport uses a barrierless entry system — so if you're unfamiliar with how it works and assume, like at many other airports, that a short drop-off is free, you could end up with a hefty fine just for not paying through the app. That’s not just confusing; it’s borderline unethical. It feels like they’re setting passengers up to fail, just to profit off penalties.
The lack of seating is another serious issue. For the number of passengers and operators at the airport, there simply aren’t enough places to sit. I’ve seen people sitting and eating on the floor — which is both undignified and unacceptable. It shows a clear lack of consideration for basic passenger comfort. If you want a proper place to sit, you’re often forced to buy something from one of the food outlets. Again, it feels like money is prioritized over human decency.
Overall, the experience left me feeling that passenger wellbeing is not a priority here. The policies and lack of basic facilities give the impression that the airport is more focused on extracting as much money as possible from travelers, rather than serving them. Very disappointing.

Stansted airport parking beware run as a total racketeering set up to extrude as much money as they can rather than have a payout gate to leave the airport appalling service that preys on people having to deal with a non-user-friendly payment service in the hope that people don’t sit down immediately and pay the extortion charge for the drop off outside this airport. even to stop at the petrol station or to buy something at the m&s or other services. You’ll be watched by this alien like service with cameras to try and claim additional parking charges which you don’t realize you owe until you get a bill and a fine days later an absolute license to steal money from airport users. If you check online, you’ll see how many complaints there are about this so much for the airport authority.

We used the long stay Jetpark carpark, at Stansted which is supposed to provide a bus service every 15 minutes to the airport.
On the day we flew the first bus ignored all the passengers waiting at the bus stop and drove past meaning we waited almost half an hour for a bus. That combined with travel delays on the journey to the airport and security being horrendously busy meant our party arrived at the gates seconds after they closed.
Unfortunately Stansted are now refusing to say either way whether the bus stopped at the bus stop and have told me that they will not answer my questions or correspond with me further, so I cannot provide my travel insurer with the confirmation that the bus was late either, therefore scuppering my insurance claim.
A shameful way to do business. If I could give 0 out of 5 I would.

Extremely long queues, unfriendly personnel, shameful attitude

If you have received PCN, research and look into below and challenge it :

Stansted Airport and the Pick UP/Drop Off zone are not relevant land as defined in the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 paragraph 3 (c) because the land in which the zone exists is subject to statutory control in the form of Airport Byelaws therefore, the keeper cannot be held liable for the charge, only the driver, whose identity is not revealed.

· In any case, the PCN does not seek to hold the keeper liable as per POFA 2012 as no POFA declaration is made in the charge notice. The keeper cannot be assumed to be the driver. The vehicle has more than one person authorised to drive it.

The drop off in any other industry would be a scam. However it is legalised.

You cannot perfectly align the drop off time with the intervals of parking purchase which is 15 min intervals. So I purchased 15:30 to 15:45 and arrived at 15:23 and they charged me £100. If they know I was within 15 mins of that time and only there for 10 mins it should be enough. What am I meant to do wait at the entrance and block traffic for 7 mins so I don’t get a ticket?

They’re just a scheme to exploit the situation at your expense. It a legalised scam.