Eurostar: St Pancras to introduce facial verification to reduce queues

Eurostar passengers leaving London can now speed up the check-in process by using a new facial verification system.

The launch of the technology aims to ease congestion and queues at St Pancras Station. The company has said enhanced post-Brexit checks by French border staff have increased the time it takes to process passengers at the station.

The technology will be available for Business Premier and Carte Blanche passengers, who will need to use an app before they travel to scan their identity documents and verify their face and ticket.

At the station, they walk in front of a screen and have their face detected. If they are approved, they can proceed through doors which open automatically.

If this proves to be successful, Eurostar would like to make it more available for customers in the future.

The company also said that while SmartCheck, the name of the system developed by iProov, is only in use at St Pancras, it could be introduced more widely across the Eurostar network in mainland Europe.

Bags will still be scanned by security staff, and border officials in London, and Paris are continuing to check passports as before.

The firm's chief executive Gwendoline Cazenave said: "We continue looking for solutions to increase capacity in stations and simplify the passengers' flows."

Bags will still be scanned by security staff and French border officials will also check passports.

Earlier this year, Eurostar was forced to leave hundreds of seats empty on trains to and from London to avoid long queues at stations.

The situation has since improved but dozens of seats are not being offered for sale on some services.

Andrew Bud, chief executive of iProov, said: "By creating a biometric corridor, we are moving security checks away from the station, saving precious time and space at the border, streamlining the boarding process to one that's far faster, more convenient, less crowded and stressful, yet even more secure."

Heathrow Airport also began trialling facial biometric scanners back in 2019, but the project was dropped when passenger numbers collapsed due to the coronavirus pandemic.