Chennai Int'l Airport Reporting Time

A client of ours is visiting us for a day from New Jersey. His return flight is at 5:50 PM at Anna Int'l Airport, Chennai on February 26. Since I am making an agenda for his visit, I want to him to spend as much time as possible with us. I am considering an hour and half for the transfer to airport from my office. How long do the check-in formalities take for a foreigner? Please advise me. What would be the ideal time for reporting at the airport considering 5:50 PM as the time of departure?

You must be very familiar with how long it takes to get from your place to the airport. I expected to do it in half an hour the other night, but the Kathipara traffic jam took at least 10 minutes, and that was at 11.30pm!

The standard arrival time for an international flight is three hours before departure and I would say two hours minimum. Arriving at departure-3:00 gets you through pretty quickly, and you wonder why you bothered, but a fellow traveller once told me that if you don't, you get stuck in big queue's and miss the flight!

If your client's airline has an online checkin process do use it. This will very much reduce the queueing and check-in time at the airport. The check-in site will tell who what time to get there and which desk to go to.

Rangss, I was at the Chennai Int'l airport last month and the check-in took almost the entire 3 hours that I was there. And that was with having to cut ahead in one of the three astronomically long lines twice so as not to miss my flight. Never seen such long lines in my life. I managed to make it on the plane about 15 min. before take off. Oh, and I had already checked in (along with my luggage) in Delhi. Didn't seem to reduce the wait at all as you still have to pass thru customs and hmmm, I forget what the 2nd line was for (I was tired!) -- preboarding? This was at 1 a.m. No idea if this is typical or what it's like at other times.

Tell him to get to the airport at 3 pm.

this past tuesday night/wednesday early morning, after midnight, although I did online check-in and could check my bags at Lufthansa's Business Class window, the entire process was exceedingly slow.

My flight left at 1:50 AM and I did not get to the gate until literally 1:40 AM! I waited about 45 minutes in the Immigration line (along with a zillion other people of course) and it did not help that I was deathly ill. Truth be told, I almost passed out in the line.

They were so slow that I wondered if there was a security incident in the year and 9 months I had been to India, because the Immigration officers scanned everyone's face very intently telling people to look them in the eyes. Frankly, it freaked me out.

Plus you have to go through security before you get to the gate and believe me, they are not going to hurry up for anyone. When I got to security the board said that my plane was boarding and the women officers were searching an African woman in full tribal dress in a wheelchair, going through every nut and bolt of that wheelchair and every fold and crease of her dress and headgear, so of course there was a backup.

and if all that wasn't enough, before you got on the plane, between the gate and the plane, security was pulling some people out of line and going over their passports yet again.

In a word, it sucked, especially when you are weak and disoriented and feel like puking -- which I probably should have done because it might have sped things up.

That's much worse than I am used to.

The probable cause is that security has been tightened up for Republic Day on Jan 26th and the preceding rehearsals.

(Sorry we didn't get you there earlier)

I'd agree. Get there 3 hours ahead. Maybe it will take less time in which case your friend can just relax.

YogaGal, why on earth were you flying if you were so sick?

uh, maybe because it was the day I was supposed to leave? and I wanted to get home to my own bed and toilet? and honestly, that was 6th day of my illness. the first 5 days were a hell of a lot worse and I had been in the hospital that day for an IV drip anyway. I'll spare you the gory details.

actually on my first day of sickness I should have found an internet cafe, logged into IndiaMike, registered under a new name, and asked, "I'm in India and in my hotel room and am very sick, I'm puking and have diarrhea, what should I do? Can you recommend any medicine I should take? I have a 105 fever, should I see a doctor?"

then I would have just waited to see how long it would take for all the mods to yell at me that we don't give medical advice here....

sorry -- couldn't help myself...
my husband did tell me that I must be feeling better if my sarcasm returns.

i flew out of chennai last night. my flight was at 23.15 & i reached the check in counter at 2200. it was comfortable & there was no queue in the immigration at all. spent about 6-7 minutes in the security check line.

i guess there is no hard & fast rule, it all depends on your luck & the number of flights departing at the same time.

I think you can safely reach the check in counter 1hr & 30 mins before your flight. anything beyond that is a bit of a risk.

Rangss, Leaving Chennai earlier this month was more along the lines of escape. In recent memory, I can't think of a worse experience. Not only was it raining, but, the traffic at 9:30pm when I left Tnagar was at a standstill through Adhyar. I then spent 3 hours waiting (wading) through the sea of check-in confusion, they gave our seats away and we were their 2 hours prior!, the longest lines I've ever seen anywhere in the world just to get to the immigration and the longest lines I've ever seen once again to get through the inspection. Like others, I boarded the plane 15 minutes before takeoff and that was after they delayed the flight for 1.5 hours waiting for everyone to get on board. 1:30am takeoff to Bangkok. Luckily, it is only a 3 hour flight. That airport needs to be blown off the face of the earth. For a city the size of Chennai, it is woefully inadequate and I will think very hard about flying out of there again.

Adyar isn't on the way to the airport from T Nagar --- so that wouldn't have been a good start! Maybe the driver knew something about other routes being even worse.

Chennai and rain is like England and snow. It brings everything to a halt.

I guess I've come and gone through Chennai airport a few times now, and I have never had a bad experience. They have modernised and improved it a lot in the last couple of years.

I hope the several bad reports here are not the start of a new trend!

hmmmmm.....that's how I feel about the hotel I stayed at in Chennai....

but that review will follow as soon as I am fully recovered from my SALMONELLA FOOD POISONING CONTRACTED AT THE ELITE HOTEL IN COCHIN.

someone should bomb their bakery counter!

oh my god, salmonela((((((

it's safer to eat a street food, fried in a super hot oil than food at expensive hotels. my wife got the worst indian bug in a maharaja retreat in ooty.

back on topic - chennai AP is horribly slow, be there 3 hours early.

just because it's called "Elite" doesn't mean it is! I did not stay there, only bought from their bakery counter....

now back on topic.....

I think you have to take 2 factors into consideration

1. your travel to the Airport
2. the number of flights taking off around your flight time.

I think #2 is highlye variable. If there are 3 flights taking of at the same time, your wait time could do up from 30 mins (if yous was the only flight) to 3 hours. Getting early to the aiport helps. But, if there are 3 flights taking off at 4pm, good luck.

I tried to google the flight schedule at the Anna airport. Unfortunately i failed to find anything similar to this (for Bangalore)http://www.bangaloreairport.com/php/...ay=1&airport=7

Are you SURE he's flying INTERNATIONAL from Chennai, or is he first flying to Delhi or Mumbai on a DOMESTIC flight before catching a connecting abroad?