Beat the immigration queue at Heathrow for 50 pounds

A controversial new fast-tracking service will be launched at London Heathrow Airport next year which will see passengers able to jump the immigration queue and use a fast gate for a fee of £50. The fee would be in the form of an annual subscription.

The queue jumping system is already in place to a lesser extent at both Liverpool and Luton airports which provide customers leaving the country with the capacity to do so for a fee.

Passengers may also book their preffered seats up to 24 hours in advance for a small fee. Within 24 hours the service is free of charge.

The additional £50 charge would then allow passengers to utilise one of the new high-tech fast gates which are currently being installed. The new gates feature readers for biometric passports which feature electronic chips and contain details of facial mapping. Biometric passports were introduced in 2006 but to date the total number of Britons with a biometric passport still numbers under 20 million.

For those who do hold a biometric passport the new service will be able to do so without any additional charges, along with any EU nationals holding biometric documentation. A new subscription proposal will be launched to target those UK citizens with the old passports.

The queue jumping scheme will also be made available to VIP or ‘trusted’ travellers from outside the UK and it is hoped that the scheme will in time pay for the £7 million upgrade.

Britons wishing to obtain one of the new biometric passports can do so by renewing their current passport early, which costs around £80.