my travel agent has booked me on a flight from philadelphia to manchester, england w/ a connecting flight to edinburgh. the second flight departs less than 1 hour after landing in manchester. is that a reasonable amount of time within which to clear customs and change terminals

Manchester is a rather small airport, but it still seems a bit of a tight connection. I'd see about other flights for that day, in case you do miss the connection. You can always try to make the original flight and if you don't you'll know if there is another. otherwise, I'd have the agent re-book.

Will your luggage be checked through or will you have to claim it and re-check?

Manchester is actually a pretty large airport - a lot smaller than heathrow, but still large. There are 2 terminals, a lot depends on whether or not you need to change terminals, and as the other post enquired, collect your luggage. It sounds like a very tight connection, especially if you have to do either of the above. Customs takes hardly any time at all - unless you are unlucky enough to get searched (not very likely). Immigration usually takes a lot less time than it does in the US but be prepared for delays if a lot of flights arrive close together.
Good luck.
Carolina

I guess in my head I compare Manchester to all the other airports I've been through - like Schipol, Atlanta, Malpensa...and Manchester seems like a small airport to me. I guess it is subjective

What's the on-time percentage for your PHL-MAN flight? That might affect your odds.

I <b> still </b> think the &quot;make or break&quot; issue is whether or not your luggage is checked through. If it is then clearing Immigration should be fairly fast.

Correct me if I'm wrong..an I'm sure someone will.. But even if the luggage is checked thru , it will have to be collected and then rechecked at the first point of arrival after an international flight and before connecting to a dosmetic flight. It doesn;t require going thru a chceckin line again, usually there is a drop off point or an agent to collect it for the next flight.
The important thing is to make sure luggage is checked thru and the passenger is ticketed thru.

A connection that is less than 1 hour between an international and domestic flight would make me nervous. Even if your luggage is checked through, every flight we've taken like this required retrieving our luggage, hauling through a customs point and throwing it back on a luggage carousel to be taken to the next plane. If a couple of 747's happen to arrive at the same time as your flight you may not breeze through this point even if you don't have anything to declare. The other thing to consider is whether you have a seat booked on the domestic flight or if you have to do that after you arrive. Not all European airlines pre-assign domestic seating. And if they have the same rules as the US airlines, there may be a cut-off time to check-in. So if you don't want to stress about it, give your agent a call and see what other options are available.

Hi ips,

I get antsy about connections less than 90 min.

Which airlines? There are three terminals at MAN, so it will depend on how far you have to go between terminals/gates.

Here's a link to a map of MAN, with info about which airlines are in which terminals.

FWIW, we connected through MAN last summer on a trip to Edinburgh -- flying bmi on both flights and using terminals 3 and 1. We had a one-hour scheduled connection. Had our inbound flight been on time, it would have been no problem. It took about 20 minutes from gate to gate, with an immigration/security checkpoint in between. As it was, we were over an hour late due to runway problems at O'Hare. By the time we landed, bmi had already prepared new boarding cards for a later flight. Our bags were checked through to EDI, and we cleared customs at EDI, not MAN.

Sorry, hit post too soon. Here's the link:

http://www.manchesterairport.co.uk/web.nsf/Content/Maps

You might check to see what your other options from MAN-EDI will be, should you miss the connection. If you're on bmi, they do have four or five flights per day.

ips50
We have exactly the same concern on a
similar flight, only from Dulles (WAS)
We are booked on a BMI Flght from
Dulles to Manchester that is supposed to arrive at 6 AM. We are then supposed to connect to another BMI flight to Edinburgh that leaves at 7 AM.
This leave us one hour to clear
immigration/security and make the terminal change for this domestic flight connection.
It appears by ms_go's posting that are
luggage will be checked all the way to Edinburgh. However, although we have seat assignments for the international portion of our flight, we cannot get seat assignments for our connecting flight. BMI tells us that this is a &quot;good&quot; connection.
Has anyone else out there ever had to make this connection?

BMI have several flights a day between Manchester &amp; Edinburgh, so if you miss one they'll just put you on the next.

Also chances are, transatlantic flights often arrive ahead of schedule so you have ample time for connection. While you have to trasfer from Terminal 1 International to Terminal 3 Domestic, it's in fact the same building and requires only a short walk. And BMI often hold connecting flights to await late-arriving passengers. If you miss connection, they will just put you on next flight (0855 M-F, none on Sat, but BA fly as well).

TCC - you will most likely get seat assignments and a boarding pass for your MAN-EDI flight when you check in at Dulles (we did, anyway). As Alec said, the two terminals are in the same building, and the BMI gates are relatively close together. If your inbound flight is on time, you should have plenty of time. If it is late, bmi will just put you on the next flight, as they did with us. I posted the link to a map of the airport above, which might be helpful for familiarizing yourself with your arrival and departure gates.

I don't know what aircraft bmi is using for the MAN-EDI route currently, but last summer these flights were on regional jets, which hold fewer passengers and board very quickly. I don't think they began boarding until about 15 minutes prior to flight time.

do not worry about these connections as far as luggage is concerned.

your luggage should be checked through to destination.
you will only have to deplane and go to connecting flights area, transit, and go through a passport control and look for gate.

you will go through customs at destination.. not at first point of entry like in the USA.

Actually we are flying out of Dulles on a Friday and arriving at MAN on Saturday. BMI has only one direct MAN/Edinburgh flight that day..... Saturday..ours
So, thanks to everyone for helping to alleviate our fears of missing this connection. With our luggage checked through it should only depend on our international flight arriving close to on time.

When I fly from SFO to Amsterdam where I change planes (KLM) to Venice the luggage I have checked in SFO is never seen again until I arrive in Venice. I do have to go through immigrations at Amsterdam and security again, but that is it. The same coming home.

Thank you everyone.
We have previously flown from Wash to Amsterdam and then connected to a flight for to Rome, and Wash to Frankfurt where we connected for a flight to Catania and had our luggage checked all the way through.

Thanks for clearing up my misconception that we would have to claim our luggage since our connection was for a destination also in the U.K.
I had thought that we had to do just what Jody's post had said,

&quot;it will have to be collected and then rechecked at the first point of arrival after an international flight and before connecting to a dosmetic flight. It doesn;t require going thru a checkin line again, usually there is a drop off point or an agent to collect it for the next flight.&quot;

We thought that's how it's done in the U.S. so it's probably the same for the UK.

Thank you ms_go for sharing your experience on a similar route.