Nationwide passport system outage forces manual processing as travellers face major airport delays
International travellers are facing major delays at airports across the country after a nationwide passport system outage forced the Australian Border Force to switch to manual processing.
A Melbourne Airport spokesperson told the ABC the ABF had advised it was dealing with a system-wide issue affecting all inbound and outbound passengers.
“(The) ABF is processing passengers manually,” the spokesperson said.
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“We appreciate passengers’ patience as ABF works to resolve this issue.”
The scale of the outage remains unclear, but the disruption has caused long queues and extended wait times at several terminals as border officers work through passengers one by one.
Airports are urging travellers to allow extra time and expect delays as the backlog continues to build.
The Nightly has contacted the ABF for a comment.
More to come...
